


Paris is Always A Good Idea

by crystanagahori



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, MAJOR LIBERTIES TAKEN, Minor GingerRose, More Harrison Ford/Julia Ormond than Audrey Hepburn/Humphrey Bogart, Romcom retelling, Sabrina retelling, minor stormpilot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-02-23 03:10:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 49,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23171488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crystanagahori/pseuds/crystanagahori
Summary: Rey grew up in an apartment over the garage of Solo mansion, the driver's charge, watching from a distance as millionaire playboy Poe Dameron Solo, one of the two famous Solo sons, made every woman in a ten mile radius fall in love with him (including her).Just before she leaves to study in Paris, Rey tells Poe how she feels. But unfortunately it was Poe's older brother, Ben Solo, that heard it.A retelling of Sabrina (1995).
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey & Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 124
Kudos: 488





	1. Chapter 1

__

_Once upon a time, on a North coast of Long Island not far from New York, there was a very,very large mansion—almost a castle—where there lived a family by the name of Solo…_

_Of course the rain stops on the night of a party_ , Rey thought to herself, looking up at the perfectly clear blue sky as she closed the door to the living quarters behind her. _The family would have never have stood for it._

There was a magic to the air she couldn’t describe, a little spring in her step as she heard the music in the distance, saw the lights. She didn’t even know what the family was celebrating tonight, only that they were, and she wanted to see it. She needed to see it.

“Going somewhere, kid?” Luke Skywalker asked as Rey walked past him and Chewie as she cut through the mansion’s kitchen. Somewhat of an eccentric, Leia’s twin brother had purchased Apple stock completely by accident and made himself billions of dollars without actually meaning to. Now he was more than happy living out his days wandering the mansion, playing a round of tong-its with the boys in the servants quarters and generally enjoying his semi-reclusive life. He was the one who brought both Rey in to the Solo Mansion eight years ago, under the care of Chewie, the family driver.

“Ummm, just outside!” She exclaimed, grabbing an hors d’oeuvre from the nearest tray, an orange and a bottle of water. Rey was eighteen years old, too anxious to wait for the rest of the world to catch up to her, and there was very little Luke or Chewie could say to stop her.

“Aren’t you supposed to be packing?” Chewie asked, and if Rey could see past the massive dark hair of his, she would have notice him raising an eyebrow at her. “Your flight to Paris is tomorrow.”

“That’s plenty of time!” Rey insisted, snorting and rolling her eyes the way kids do whenever the boomers tried to reason with them. “I’ll be right back. I’m just going for a walk.”

“Rey, the full time ogling of Poe Dameron Solo is not a recognized profession!” Chewie called after her.

“If you’re going to climb up that tree again to ogle Poe, then be careful about it!” Maz Kanata, the family cook yelled over her shoulder at Rey. “And don’t think I didn’t see Rose swipe a crab cake!”

“Will do!” Rey promised, jogging out of the house to look for her friend. It didn’t take Rey too long to find her. Rose was Rey’s only friend in high school, and she lived not too far from the Solo residence. And while the Tico’s fortune was just about as large as the Solo’s, the family had a Children Not Allowed to Join Parties Until They were Eighteen, which Rose was, sadly, one month short.

Paige, her older sister, was in attendance tonight, in a dark green gown that brought out the color of her eyes. Rose and Rey had both sighed at Paige, who simply laughed and promised to bring them back some dessert.

“One day the two of you will grow up, and you’ll wish you didn’t have to attend parties liek these,” Paige told them, oh so very grown up at twenty one.

“Rose, come on, they’re just about to start dancing,” Rey tugged her friend’s arm in a way of greeting her. Rose immediately followed, the two girls giggling as they ran across the driveway.

“Green pinstripes, Rey. I saw him when I took the side entrance. He’s wearing green pinstripes, looking like he walked out of the pages of Italian Vogue, and I’m over here in okd sweats,” Rose frowned down at her outfit, which looked comfortable and snug, and took nothing away from how pretty she was. And because Rey was Rey, she laughed and pressed down on the little flick on her hair.

“You look pretty,” she assured her best friend. “And if Poe Dameron Solo can’t see how wonderful you are, then…it’s his loss.”

“I’d say the same to you,” Rose told her, blushing as they came upon the large tree by the gate that overlooked the party area. And while Rose was the shorter of the two of them, it was her turn to be the lookout while Rey shimmied up the tree with the practiced grace of someone who had been doing it all her life.

She settled on the edge of the strangest of the branches, the perfect spot to watch as the 40 peice band began to play _Moondance_. Nobody threw parties like the Solos did, and every party was always a spectacle. The finest of the finest outfits in a range of colors and sizes, gorgeous jewellers, overflowing champagne, and as many twinkle lights as their electricity load could allow. It was always magical, and Rey sighed a familiar old sigh at the sight.

While the family threw different kinds of parties, seemed to celebrate every little occasion possible, there were a few things that always stayed the same. There was Leia Organa Solo, the matriarch, always with the best hairstyle in the room, and in Rey’s opinion, always the best dressed. She was the one who grew the family’s meager fortune into something to really talk about, and always knew exactly how to strike up conversation between two people. Leia was the opposite of her twin—outgoing, didn’t mind the spotlight, but had a tongue that was just as sharp and a heart just as generous.

She was currently speaking to the mayor of New York, arguing with him about—from what Rey could tell—pushing for a ban on plastic bags in the city.

Somewhere in the back, she heard a loud roar of laughter from a group of men huddled in the corner. And naturally, in the middle of them all, was Han Solo, carrying on a game of cards with old men. He was the one who taught Rey how to play poker and Texas Hold ‘em, and how to fleece every man who played against her. Clearly the man was playing to his strengths. And while the party was always over when a brawl started, things were still going swimmingly among them.

“Can you see him?” Rose hissed from the base of the tree. “I can’t even look over the fence, it’s too high!”

“I can’t,” Rey frowned, keeping her eyes peeled. “I see your parents, though.”

“And Paige?”

“No, she’s not with them,” Rey wrinkled her nose as her eyes swept the party, looking for the familiar green dress. Nothing. “Poe is probably late to the party. It wouldn’t be the first time!”

She heard Rose giggling, and Rey found herself laughing too, knowing fully well that they were both thinking about the same moment—Leia’s fiftieth birthday, when Poe had burst in to the family lawn on a white horse in celebration of his mother. Rey’s heart melted from the top of the tree. Rose had gotten so excited she nearly fell off the tree. It was glorious. Leia had laughed, Han had applauded, and everyone in the room had been delighted.

Except for one person. One person, who, if Rey was being completely honest, was one of the few things in the mansion that she didn’t enjoy. And he was standing so close that she could see the shape of his ears—not that they were very hard to miss.

Benjamin Organa Solo was the oldest Solo child. Rey had lived with the family for almost ten years now, and she had never, ever seen Ben laugh.

Well, she did once, but that was just one time, and she was pretty sure he was laughing _at_ her than with her.

He was the one who turned the consolidated Organa-Solo fortune into Really Serious Money when he made the family invest in setting up localized Internet connections for different counties around the United States. Ben threw himself into his work from the moment he was allowed to walk in to the board room. Even tonight, in the middle of a family celebration (Rey still wasn’t sure of the occasion), he was in full on business mode, demonstrating…something serious looking to a bunch of serious looking people.

She supposed he was handsome, in on odd sort of way. He had always been tall, and according to Luke, was “just starting to grow in to his ears.” But he was quick to anger, and almost seemed to resent that he was part of the family, and that Rey couldn’t understand at all.

“What about now?” Rose asked, pulling Rey’s attention back to scouting for the man of their dreams. It had yet to occur to Rey that there was only one Poe Dameron Solo, and two young girls looking out for him, but it didn’t much matter. It made Rey feel just a little bit less alone.

“Oh, oh there he is!” Rey exclaimed, pointing as if Rose could see, feeling her insides tense deliciously at the familiar sight of Poe Dameon Solo. He was wearing a bottle green pinstripe suit, just as Rose described, his hair perfectly coiffed and curled as he smiled and nodded politely to the familiar faces in the room. He had barely walked ten feet into the room when Rey saw the look he had on his face. Like he was struck by lighting.

Oh no. Poe Dameron Solo was once again, in love. That made it the second time this year, and it was only July.

And the object of his affection? None other than Paige Tico.

“Oh my god,” Rey gasped, unable to speak, unable to believe it. Poe had walked right up to Paige and said a few words, taking her into his arms as the music played. They looked lovely together. Rey wished that her longing had a voice, if it had, it would be so loud Poe would have to hear.

“What, what?” Rose asked in disbelief.

“She made him laugh,” Rey heard herself say wistfully. Her heart sank even further.

“Rey! What’s going on, is—oh,” Rose’s face completely changed when the opening notes of _Maybe the Night_ swelled from the orchestra. Poe always made his move when he asked the orchestra to play this song. “Ohhhhh.”

“I know,” was all Rey managed to say, watching as Poe whispered something into Paige’s ear. Right on cue, Paige turned and walked in the direction of the solarium, giving Poe the freedom to turn and head straight for the bar, where he secured a bottle of Moet, and two crystal champagne flutes to tuck into his back pockets. This was his usual M.O., which Rose and Rey and dubbed, “The Move.” They had fantasized about being on the receiving end of that, both of them.

Rey was too lost in the fantasy of it all to remember that Paige was walking to the Solarium, which meant she was walking to…

“Paige!” Rose gasped, and Rey’s heart jumped in her chest, worried that Rose had made the connection. “Where are you going?”

“Rose! I was…I…” Rey had never seen Paige look so flustered, and Poe was on his way. “I was going to the Solarium, actually.”

“The Solarium?” Rose repeated, and Rey didn’t have to know her friend too well to hear the heartbreak in the voice, to know that she knew exactly what her sister was about to do. Suddenly she was very subdued, and the most quiet Rey had ever seen her.

And shit, Poe was coming up to where they were standing.

On instinct, Rey leapt from the tree. She didn’t even know where she was landing, only that she needed to intercept Poe before he saw the Tico sisters. What Rey hadn’t counted on, was that she would end up falling _into_ someone.

“Ow, fuck!” Ben Solo cursed as he and Rey toppled to the floor just in front of Poe, who immediately took a step back and looked at them both with slight confusion and amusement.

“Well, this is new,” Poe commented, hiding the champagne bottle behind him. “I didn’t realize you two were friends.”

“We’re not!” Rey insisted a little _too_ loudly, quickly disentangling herself from Ben, who was still on the ground.

“I didn’t realize we had monkeys on the property,” Ben grumbled, glaring at Rey as his brother helped him stand with his free hand.

“What were you doing up that tree?” Poe asked, amusement dancing in his face and looking at Rey like he wasn’t really seeing her at all.

“I was…” Rey was suddenly very aware that she was standing in front of both the Solo boys in a neon green tank top, her rattiest sports bra, and her oldest pair of sweatpants, while they were wearing fucking suits. “Packing. For my trip.”

“Your trip?” Poe asked, like he had no idea what she was talking about.

“Paris,” Ben explained. “She’s going for the summer before she starts university there.”

“I…yes,” Rey nodded, surprised that Ben knew. But then again, there was very little that Ben didn’t know about. “I should…”

“Go back in to finish packing,” Ben said, and it was very hard to miss the fact that he was dismissing her right off hand. If Rey wasn’t already a mature woman and off to Paris to become even more worldly, she would have huffed and frowned at him, and stomped her foot. But as it was, she was trying to maintain some sort of composure in front of the Love of Her Life.

“Preferably not up trees,” Poe said, winking conspiratorially at Rey, and her heart opened, because it was like there was a secret code between just the two of them. “I’ll see you later, brother. Where are you off to so early?”

“I need to check on the Tokyo markets before they close. Where are _you_ going?” Ben asked, narrowing his eyes at Poe.

“Oh the usual, brother. Being the perfect black sheep of the family. Baaaa,” Poe bleated as he skipped past them to the direction of the Solarium, past the tree, where Rey couldn’t see neither Paige nor Rose now. Crap. Rey was going to have to look for her friend.

She was about to walk past him when she head Ben call her name. She turned around, and was just in time to see him walking off in a completely different direction, like she’d imagined him calling for her.

Huh. Weird.

* * *

“Rose? Rose!” Rey called, feeling the night chill as she looked desperately around for her friend. The guys at the gates hadn’t seen her, and she wasn’t in Rey’s room. Rey was checking the indoor tennis court when she finally saw her.

“Rey?” Rose asked tentatively, turning from where she was sitting at the referee’s chair. This was their usual post-party spot, where they pretended to play tennis and talked about the parties and the songs they wished they could dance to. When Poe was busy in the solarium, they were moan and groan over it, and cry about how it was unfair that they couldn’t attend the party too. Then the fireworks would begin, and they could lay down in the outdoor tennis court to see it all.

But for some reason, all of those times did not seem as painful as this.

“Hi,” Rose said, as she made her way down from the chair. “I hate him.”

“Oh Rose,” Rey said, wrapping her arms around her friend the second she ran over to Rey.

“I’m not mad at Paige at all,” Rose said, evidently trying her hardest no to cry even as she wrapped her arms even more firmly around Rey. “How can I be? She’s my sister, and she had no idea how I felt. I’m…I’m mad at Poe. He’s…he’s awful, isn’t he? He broke my heart and he didn’t even know. And he’s never going to look at us the way we want him to. And now that he has Paige…”

Rage roiled inside Rey in a way that took even her aback. She had never been this angry before, even when Luke insisted on taking her home to the mansion when she was eight (‘but my family! They won’t know where to find me!’). But Rey had so few relationships she valued as much as she did Rose’s. And she was willing to fight a full grown man for it, even the man she thought she loved.

“We should tell him,” Rey said. “He has to know.”

“No, no! It’s better this way. I can spend our entire Paris trip forgetting about him,” Rose brushed a tear from her eye. “I won’t be mad if you still love him, Rey.”

“I do,” Rey said quickly, almost a bit too quickly, if she was thinking about it too hard.

So after she settled Rose back into her bedroom, Rey slipped out of bed and marched up toward the mansion, glaring at the windows. The lights in Poe’s room were on. The party was still in full swing, but she knew that at around this time, Han was probably sweeping his companions, and a fight would break out soon. She could hear it in the roars of protests over the din of the music.

With a slow exhale, Rey walked up to the house, slipping in through the French doors in one of the game rooms. Then she made her way upstairs to Poe’s room like she had every right to be, and paused when she realized the door was open. Light spilled on the hallway from the inside, and she heard rustling from there.

Rey walked in and closed the door behind her, standing by the wall.

“Poe?” She asked tentatively.

“I—“

“Please don’t say anything else. And don’t come out,” Rey sighed, already feeling the burden in her heart start to lighten. “I can’t do this if I have to look at you. I came to say goodbye.”

Silence. Just as she wanted.

“I just wanted to ask you not to think of me while I’m gone,” she continued. “Not that you thought of me while I was even here, but…just in case. I know you don’t know this, but I know you, Poe. I think you’re wonderful and generous, and incredibly funny, and that you didn’t mean to hurt Rose with what you did. I mean, how could you, you didn’t even know how we…anyway. Just know that someone is thinking of you from far away. And that if you ever need anything—“

“Stop,” A voice that definitely wasn’t Poe’s emerged from the closet, and Rey took a step back as she realized, horrifyingly, that she had just spilled her heart out to the wrong Solo brother.

“Oh my god!” She exclaimed, her hand scrabbling for the doorknob. “Oh my god I’m so sorry, I—“

“Rey,” he said, holding up his palms in an attempt to calm her.

“You called me a monkey,” Rey said.

“I know,” he said like he was the one who had intruded in to the house and not her. “I thought you were going to finish packing.”

“I was,” Rey sniffed, she didn’t realize she’d been crying. “I’m going to go do that now. I just wanted to…to say goodbye, obviously. Please say goodbye to your parents for me.”

“I will,” he said, and she thought she imagined the defeat on his face as he said that. “What about Poe?”

“I don’t want to talk about him with you,” Rey insisted. “So. Goodbye, Ben.”

“Goodnight, Rey.”

And if she was still crying when she slipped back in to bed, neither Ben nor Poe would ever know.

* * *

“Is she all packed?” Han asked, arriving at the garage just as the household staff gathered at the driveway to wish her goodbye. Rey was hugging Maz, promising she would send back the finest wines and cheeses, anything she wanted. “I had a last minute going away present I wanted to give her.”

“Please don’t tell me it’s related to your son,” Chewie mumbled at his friend as Han pulled a slightly thick envelope from his pocket.

“I may have slipped a baby picture in there, sure,” Han said as Chewie rolled his eyes. “But it’s cash. Jeez Chewie. I just want the kid to have a good time. I have to promise to watch over you and Luke since she’ll be so far away.”

“I’m starting to wonder if Paris is far enough,” Chewie grumbled, frowning as Rey hurried up and back down the stairs, this time with her arms laden with her hastily packed bags, her backpack and her jacket. It had surprised her that she’d owned this many things, she never thought she would, and now she couldn’t bear to leave any of it behind.

“You be good, now,” Luke said, patting Rey’s head after they exchanged a warm hug. “Don’t hold hands with strangers. Boys have pretty eyes, but they’ll break your heart.”

“Why were you looking at me when you said that,” Han asked, making Rey laugh.

“Just have a good time,” Luke chuckled. “Maybe it’s a good time to start asking yourself what you really want out of life, kid?”

The question had taken her aback. Rey never thought she would have options like this, much less thought she would ever get to see Paris. She never even thought that she had the right to ask herself what she wanted out of her own life. For so long, it had all been about little things. Poe-related things, but now…everything felt so wide open.

“I’m not going to miss you,” Rey frowned at Luke, but hugged him again anyway.

“Me either,” Luke said, and at that exact moment, Rey really started to cry. She gave Han one last hug and boarded her things into the car. As the Rolls Royce Falcon pulled from the driveway, Rey turned in her seat and watched the mansion get smaller, and smaller. A part of her hoped that she would at least catch a glimpse of Poe before she left, but that wasn’t to be.

She did, however, see Ben Solo emerge from the house, his brow furrowed. He gave Rey a little nod, the last person to say goodbye to Rey before she left. 


	2. Chapter 2

FIVE YEARS LATER

Paris was incredible.

Every day she was there, Rey woke up with a sense of disbelief that a place like this could be real. That a place like _this_ , could be hers, in a way. For a girl who had never truly owned anything, it always felt monumental when she was allowed something. A book, a dress, a city. People sometimes doubted that the generosity of the Solos was genuine, because how could a family own so much still be able to give away as much as they did? But it was all real.

Chewie had given her a home. Luke had given her the world. Han and Leia had given her Paris.

She opened the windows of her attic studio in the 4th arrondissement, letting the sunlight and the sounds of the city into the room. Sure Rue de Rivoli got noisy on the worst days, but Rey was much too in love with the neighborhood to care. From her window all she could see were rows of balconies and blue roofs of the Haussman buildings, some of her neighbors standing out of their balconies for a smoke or hanging their washing. The Eiffel Tower was in a completely different direction, but she really didn’t need to see it to know that she was in Paris. In. Paris.

Her entire studio apartment buzzed at the sound of someone at her door. Rey peered over her window just enough to see Rose standing on street level by her door.

“Rose!” Rey exclaimed, waving at her friend.

“Hey! Are you dressed yet?” Rose asked. “We’re supposed to be at the Hotel de Ville in an hour!”

“It’s a ten minute walk away!” Rey yelled down at her, and in the distance, she was sure she heard someone say ‘keep it down, Americans!’ and it made her giggle and buzz Rose into the apartment.

While Rose navigated five flights up, Rey quickly showered, brushed her teeth, and was in the process of putting on her overalls. Then she tossed her wallet and phone into her front pocket like she was a mama kangaroo, and tied her hair up hastily in a ponytail. Because she was working part time for a fashion magazine, she also threw on a pair of hoop earrings and tinted lip balm that kept her lips feeling moist and shiny. The French were all the about the natural look, anyway. Then she grabbed her camera from where it always was, waiting on her desk, and looped it over her neck.

“Hey!” Rose exclaimed, smiling brightly at her as she appeared at Rey’s doorway. Two years ago, she was complaining to Rey about the height of those stairs, how she would never get used to them, living in Paris, but now Rose didn’t even break a sweat anymore. “Ready for lun—what is that.”

Rey tensed suddenly, as she knew exactly what Rose was talking about. There was very little else in the room that would have caught her attention. Rey’s apartment was so small that she didn’t really have room to put anything non-essential, except for the neat stack of carefully curated photography books balancing between an old wall panel and her desk to create a tiny nook. Balanced on top of that was a cork board, one Rey had filled with instant photos of her and Rose, theater tickets, photos of shoots she’d helped work on, and a postcard photo of Han, Leia, Chewie and Luke from last Christmas, which (they had been proud to tell her on the postcard) they had printed themselves. In a print shop. Rey didn’t even know they still had print shops in Long Island.

“It’s…Poe’s baby picture,” Rey winced, attempting to usher Rose quickly out the door as her best friend danced from her persuasions and made a beeline for the board, her eyes wide and her jaw slightly dropped.

“Why do you even _have_ Poe’s baby picture?” She asked, like she wasn’t sure if she was going to be incensed or amused.

“Han gave it to me!” Rey explained, tying her sandals on. “He’d slipped it in with the cash he gave when I left as a joke, I think.”

“As a joke,” Rose scoffed. “You know, it’s like your head is in Paris, but your heart’s still in Long Island.”

“That’s a mean thing to say,” Rey frowned, as she and Rose finally left the apartment. They had done this so often that they didn’t even have to talk about it, they just headed straight for the Monoprix to purchase sandwiches, drinks, a bag of chips to split between them, then to the patisserie next door to share dessert. “You know how much I love it here in Paris. It’s like a second home.”

_Second home,_ she thought, shaking her head in disbelief.

“I know that,” Rose assured her. Once they had their goodies with them, they walked in the direction of Place des Vosges. “And I swear, it’s like you were always meant to be a photographer, Rey. Your photos are amazing. And people seem to agree.”

Rey flushed, unused to the compliment. When she first arrived in Paris, everything felt so new, it was like something had opened up inside her. So she bought an old camera and started taking photos. Rose’s pale pink lips curled over a cup of coffee, laughing as her green painted fingernails cradled the cup. Morning light coming in through her window as it bounced off an old wine bottle a cafe was using as decor. The green of the water as kids pushed boats into the fountain at Tuileries garden. The light, almost minty green of the curls in the roof of the Grand Palais.

She found new ways to see the world in Paris. And people started paying attention, started asking if she was interested in creating content for them. And just like that, she had a career. She got the internship at the magazine with rose to pick up more technical skills, to learn as much as she could before she had to go back to America. It was like her life had finally slotted into place, and she was thrilled.

But she had to admit that Rose was a little right.

“But you’re still hung up over Poe.”

“Not hung up, just…determined. I think,” Rey frowned. Sure her heart still fluttered at the thought of him and his curls, his smile. She thought she always would, which sounded as hopeless as it felt. But the love she had for him was too deeply ingrained in her that she was no longer sure how real it was anymore. “It’s just…the day we decided that we were in love with him, it meant something to me.”

They arrived at the park, which was surprisingly not that full, even on the lovely spring day. The Place des Vosges was a secret, secluded courtyard park that straddled the third and fourth arrondissements. The pavilions that surrounded the park on all four sides resembled the rest of the district very little—it was made of red and white brick, with blue roofs that hinted at its former life as a palace. Rey always loved sitting in the grass here, listening to the fountains and taking photos when they could.

“The day we became best friends?” Rose teased, giggling as Rey lay down on the grass and remembered the moment, when she and Rose were at the Solos’ outdoor pool. Rose insisting that she was much happier in the shade, and Rey worried about if she should push her new friend into swimming or not.

But then Poe had emerged at the pool with a towel over one shoulder, a pair of aviators over his eyes, wearing tiny swim shorts. He’d smiled at the girls and gave them a wink.

“Ladies,” he’d said, and Rey could still hear it clear as day. Then he’d tossed his towel on one of the lounge chairs before he dove into the water, curls and all. They were thirteen, and stood very little chance against the twenty one year old. Rey and Rose had gasped and looked at each other, and just like that, a friendship was born.

“Yeah,” Rey laughed in present day Paris. “And a lot of other memories of home that I’ve associated with him. It’s just very hard to let go of.”

“Because you didn’t have any of those things before,” Rose nodded, completely understanding. She’d never been orphaned, but Rey had spoken to her enough about her experience for Rose to get that gist. She reached over and squeezed Rey’s arm. “You deserve only good things, Rey. None of those good things are going to go away just because you’re not obsessed with Poe anymore.”

Surprisingly, Rose had gotten over Poe very quickly. Maybe it was the fact that he’d dated Paige that just ended it all for Rose, but it was like a switch had turned off for her the moment she got to Paris. It helped that Poe and Paige’s relationship never really lasted longer than that summer, but once Rose Tico set her mind something, she was loathe to change it.

At first, Rey really thought it would mean that their friendship would change now that there was nothing binding them together, but it had been five years. Surely, by now, she knew that it wasn’t the case. But some old habits were hard to break.

“I mean, realistically, do you think you can just come home, and he’ll realize what an idiot he was, and fall in love with you right away?” Rose popped a bit of lemon tart into her mouth.

“It’s…a possibility,” Rey mumbled. “Stranger things have happened.”

“Yeah,” Rose laughed. “They have.”

“Now smile and show me those pretty daisy nails I see you got without me,” Rey giggled, holding up her camera to Rose. They had a bit of time before they had to be at Hotel de Ville for the shoot, so Rey insisted on doing a whole photoshoot with Rose, her pretty spring nails and get fifty thousand likes for it. Rose insisted on taking a few shots of Rey as well, showing her the result.

“That,” she said to her friend. “Is the face of someone who knows herself too well to still be obsessed by one guy.”

“I can’t make any promises,” Rey said, peering down at the photo, and for once, thinking that she actually looked happy. “But thanks.”

“De rien,” Rose smiled, taking a sip of her Orangina. “Now finish your food. We have to get to work soon.”

* * *

Rey returned to her apartment in high sprits. The shoot at Hotel de Ville had gone _fantastically_ well. Dick Avery was a brilliant photographer, and he was always more than happy to teach Rey what he knew, which she knew all too well was rare in the industry. He even let her take the initial shots for the shoot, and quickly apologized when he’d said “warm up the camera for me,” even if he’d said it in the least sexual way ever. Rey knew fashion photography wasn’t exactly her thing, but she was picking up on a lot of the basics from Avery’s technique. And it excited her that she got to do this. Avery even promised to send jobs her way, and made sure she knew he would always be a mentor to her.

It was the last day of her and Rose’s internship before they had to go back to America. It made Rey a little sad, that she was leaving Paris behind. Oh, she knew it would always be there, but it wouldn’t quite be the same.

“I’ll put you in touch with my friend, Jo Stockton. She wants to write this book about the women of New York or something like that, and she wants a photographer who can capture them purely in their element. I think you’ll do great,” Avery was telling her over the phone as she walked up the stairs of her apartment.

“Oh, that would be fantastic,” Rey gasped, although it was partly because of the stairs. “I could use a job.”

“Jo’s great. You’ll love working with her. But if you’re ever back in Paris…”

“I hope I will,” Rey said, trying not to sigh. “Thanks, Dick.”

“A toot ah loor, Rey,” his American clashed horribly with his French before he hung up the call. _See you later._ She certainly hoped so. Because as much as she missed Long Island and her little family, she was going to miss Paris even more.

“Rey, il y a quelqu’un ici pour toi,” Maz pulled her head from her thoughts as she made it to the fourth floor. Maz Kanata was Rey’s neighbor, the last apartment door she passed before she made it to her fifth floor loft. She spoke only French and Japanese, and was one of the reasons why Rey had picked up French so quickly. But she was kind, and would frequently invite her over for breakfast of fresh bread, butter and coffee.

“Moi?” Rey asked, confused. Someone was here? For her?

“Oui, oui,” Maz said like she had absolutely no time for this. “Je lui ai donné du café. Ile est…glauque.”

Curious, and slightly embarrassed that her neighbor felt the need to entertain her guest for her, Rey followed Maz into her much bigger flat, although you couldn’t tell with the amount of clutter inside. Rey remembered hearing the story of the preserved apartment in the 9th, the one that hadn’t been opened since 1942. Maz’ apartment had a similar feel, by way of 1970 instead.

Sitting in her round dining table and looking very glauque indeed, was a man in a dark suit, whose eyes were shifting nervously around the apartment. Sure the shag carpet was a little radioactive orange, but it wasn’t going to eat him.

Rey didn’t know him, but he immediately stood up, back straight, his nerves increasing as he did so. Rey thanked Maz, promised to give her all the details later, (votre amant?) and tilt her head in the direction of the hallway so he could follow.

Once they were back in the hallway, Rey made no move to go up to her apartment. It barely fit her, there was no way it was going to fit a casual conversation with a stranger.

“Err…Mademoiselle Skywalker?” The man asked. Wow, maybe nervous was his default setting. Rey nodded.

“Tu es…?” She prompted, waiting for him to fill in the blank with his name. Based on the way the man had said her name, he wasn’t much of a French speaker, but it helped to be cautious, especially since she didn’t know him.

“Mitaka, mademoiselle. Je…travallie…avec…sorry, I was told you could speak English,” he said, which did nothing to reduce the level of his nerves, clearly. “I’m here on behalf of the Solos.”

“Okay?” Rey asked, a little confused. In all her time in Paris, the family had never sent someone to speak to her—Han and Leia had just showed up at her door and dragged her to breakfast, Chewie had surprised her at school, and Luke straight up just walked in to one of her classrooms like he was supposed to teach. There were very little options left in the family to be doing this, one brother less likely than the other. “Which one?”

“Benjamin? Uh, Benjamin Solo,” Mitaka’s cheeks flushed like he couldn’t believe she had to ask. “He’s in town for business and found he had some free time in his schedule.”

Rey felt her entire body stiffen at the mention of the name. Memories from five years ago came flooding back. _I just wanted to ask you not to think of me while I’m gone. Not that you thought of me while I was even here…_ then Ben had showed up and ruined everything.

_Goodnight, Rey._ He’d dismissed her, and even if he hadn’t laughed (to her face), the memory still burned her. And now he sent an assistant here to ask her to dinner? Nice try.

“Please tell Mister Solo that I’m a very busy woman, and I will _not_ be available for dinner,” Rey sniffed, raising her chin in that way that the French had elevated to an art. She wasn’t sure if she was convincing.

“He said it was of the utmost importance that you meet him,” Mitaka explained. “he has news…of his brother.”

Rey’s stomach flipped, in a way it always did whenever someone mentioned Poe unexpectedly.

“I’m sure he’s so busy he can just tell me the news over the phone.”

“I’m afraid he insists on dinner, m’am,” Mitaka insisted. “He said you could bring along Miss Tico, if that made you more comfortable.”

Rey scoffed, because how dare Ben assume that Rose would be as free as Rey? Or that she needed her friend like some kind of security blanket. Surely she could go to dinner with the incredibly busy Ben Solo, who probably lined up this dinner appointment like another business meeting. 7PM - Dinner with Rey, tell her about Poe.

She really should just say no.

* * *

“I can’t believe you said yes to dinner with Ben Solo,” Rose’s voice didn’t accuse, but was rather amused as she and Rey walked from Tuileres station to the extremely chic neighborhood up on the 1st arrondissement, passing Christian Dior, Diptyque and Le Labo like they were nothing, mostly because they couldn’t afford it. Well, Rose could, but she wasn’t about to dip in to her strictly monitored credit cards for a _candle_.

Of course Ben would choose a restaurant on St. Honore, but Rey was surprised he’d chosen a place here, rather than something on the Champs Elyseés or Palce Vendome.

“I don’t think he gave me much of a choice,” Rey scoffed, crossing her arms over herself as her righteous anger enveloped her like a blanket.

“You mean he used the exact words to get you to come to dinner with him,” Rose snorted, shaking her head. “You know I can kind of see it, you and Ben.”

“Rose, he said—no, his assistant said—that there was news about Poe. That’s the only reason why he asked me— _us_ —to dinner. We’ve known Ben since we were ten. When has he ever done anything remotely romantic?”

Rose opened her mouth, and it was a sign of how close they were that Rey knew exactly what she was thinking of. She held up a hand to stop her friend, as if to tell her that the incident totally did not count.

She and Rose had dressed up for dinner—dresses this time, Rose in a form fitting skirt that made her look like she was the coolest girl in the room, and Rey in a floral dress that made her look much more feminine than she felt. Rey had never been the type to change for dinner, but it was something she’d learned being out here in Paris.

Even in the middle of the touristy street, the energy was incredible. She and Rose kept stopping because she _needed_ to snap a photo of those abandoned flowers outside the shop, needed to take a photo of the woman crossing the street wearing a dress pattern Maz would have loved as a throw pillow.

“God, what are we going to do with you once you leave this place?” Rose teased, tucking her arm into Rey’s as they hurried along.

“I’m not ready to handle that yet,” Rey groaned, and the both of them started laughing as they made it to the restaurant. La Rotonde St. Honoré was a more upscale restaurant masquerading as a cafe. The interiors were a little too chic to fit in with its counterparts on Montmarte or the Latin Quarter, with patterned tiled floors, cubism-inspired yellow lighting, and details that would not have been out of place in the twenties. There were more people sitting outside than in, seeing as it was a warm summer night in Paris.

And there was Ben Solo, sitting in one of the tables, nursing a glass of whiskey. Almost immediately, Rey was thrown into a riot of emotions she couldn’t identify—her blood boiled over with rage when she remembered the way he’d called her here like she was a donkey with a carrot tangled in front of her face. Her cheeks reddened when they remembered the last time they spoke. Her heart flipped in her chest, because, like it or not, Ben was a part of home just as much as the rest of his family.

Had he always been that…large? Rey was sure he wasn’t so…attractive when she was eighteen. He had one leg crossed over the other, his arm draped over the back of a chair. Dark waves of thick hair fell over his face as he raised the amber liquid to his lips. His nose was not in the way. At all. Ben had always exuded a cold confidence and strength, but at thirty-three, he radiated with it.

“God, if he looks this good, Poe must be _devastating_ ,” Rose gasped, as they walked to his table. The closer they walked, the more Rey felt her heart beating in her chest. And she really, really didn’t know why.

“Ben!” It was Rose who broke the tension, making him look up from his drink, and blink in surprise as she dove in for the double cheek kiss like they were the kind of friends who had dinner together all the time. “It’s been too long!”

“It has,” Ben agreed, his eyes glancing at Rey, as if to take in her whole appearance. “Rey.”

“Ben,” Rey said stiffly, sitting across him. The waiter, quick as a flash, came over and asked them for their drink orders. Rose ordered a glass of white wine, and Rey ordered a whiskey for herself. “You summoned me?”

“I didn’t…this was the only time I was available. I thought I told Mitaka to tell you that,” he said irritably.

“You have a phone, don’t you?” Rey asked. “So do I. I think the rest of your family knows my number, you could have asked.”

“Sorry, what did I miss?” A new voice, one Rey didn’t recognize, approached the table. But clearly Rose did, because she could swear that her friend’s gasp was _audible._

“You,” Rose spat, her words holding more venom and rage than Rey’s could have ever possessed. “What are you doing here?”

“Oh god,” The man, who already looked like he had a stick up his ass, sat up even straighter, like someone had wedged it in deeper a couple of inches. “Rose Tico.”

“Armitage Hux,” Rose sneered, and Rey had never, ever seen her friend like this. “Still cheating off your classmates in the MBA program?”

“I’ll have you know that I work at Solo Corp now,” he huffed, straightening his already impossibly straight jacket, which looked like it was tailored for him. “And I did not cheat on that test, I merely happened to glance at your paper, which by the way, was _wrong._ ”

“And yet we got the exact same score,” she told him.

“Still, it was unnecessary to _bite my finger_ after.”

“Hux,” Ben said in that deep, ‘I mean business and I have stupid sexy hair’ voice of his. “Stop.”

“So,” Rey whispered to Rose, who was now gripping her knife so hard she was afraid it would snap in two, or land right in Armitage Hux’s chest. “I guess you know him?”

“I’ll tell you later,” Rose hissed back, not once breaking eye contact from the redhead. The distraction had been so jarring that Rey had almost, _almost_ forgotten who she was having dinner with.

That was, until the food arrived shortly after their drinks, without her ordering. Rey took a lot of things seriously, but food was definitely on top of her list. Her habit of obsessively pouring over menus was legendary among people who knew her, and clearly Ben was well aware of that habit, as he had taken the liberty of ordering their dinner. Rey fumed silently from behind her drink. The _audacity_ of this man to take that away from her.

Well, he was paying for dinner.

The food arrived almost in droves as Rose and Hux continued to argue about their shared past, and Ben looked like he was getting a headache, rubbing his fingers against the side of his temple like he was already forty five fucking years old.

They were served a dish of duck rilettes with foie gras (from Maison Paris in Biarritz, their waiter had proudly proclaimed) to spread on perfectly toasted bread. A fresh salad with so many ingredients Rey was surprised the plate held it all together, and a huge entrecôte steak, enough for everyone, with a side of roasted baby potatoes and a mesclun salad.

Rey wanted it all. But at the same time, she hated that she didn’t know what else was on the menu. Did they serve fish? Was the pork just as expensive as the beef? Were there soups? And, was the dessert menu longer than the food menu? it had to be. A place like this, with a bar like that would have had an excellent dessert menu, and Rey just wasn’t going to get to see it.

She took a piece of bread and slathered it in the rilettes, not giving a care that she was not observing proper bread to dip ratio. Ben look slightly horrified as he watched her.

Well, let him.

“I see Paris hasn’t changed you,” He commented, taking another sip of his drink, because of course, he wasn’t going to eat. He probably ate something boring like a granola bar when he woke up and used that to fuel the rest of his robot brain for the whole day. “Tell me, are you still climbing up trees to spy on people’s parties?”

“I don’t know. Are you still listening in on other people’s private conversations?” She asked, already on her third piece of the rilettes. Ben huffed.

“You were the one talking to me, sweetheart,” he said, and Rey hated that he reminded her so much of his father in that moment. The he leaned back again in his seat. She hadn’t realized that he’d been leaning forward. “I’m just the messenger here.”

“A messenger sent to ply me with food before delivering bad news,” Rey noted, cutting herself a generous slice of the entrecôte and the potato. “So? What is it? Are you finally moving to New York? Retiring at 30?”

“Poe’s engaged,” he said, and the words were said so quickly that Rey didn’t realize that they had cut in to her until a second later. “To a lovely young man, Finn Sevin.”

“He’s been engaged before,” Rey shrugged, taking a bite of steak.

“We met his parents the night before I flew out to Paris,” Ben said, as if Rey was supposed to know perfectly well that Poe’s last three engagements to the actress, the tennis player and the perfumer hadn’t lasted long enough to get to introductions. Rey knew Poe, knew that he valued his family above everything else in the world, even if it seemed he was less than interested in how it was run. The man fell in love almost as often as the sun rose and set, and introducing the love of his life to family was The Major Step for him. Rey had always told herself he was just baiting his time, waiting for _her._

How ridiculous. How stupidly naive of her.

“Sevin…like the software developers?” Rose asked, and Rey had almost completely forgotten that she wasn’t the only person in the restaurant, that the world was still turning, and she was still in Paris. Her fingers felt numb, and even after she stuffed a potato into her mouth, she couldn’t taste it.

“The very same,” Hux nodded, suddenly civil for the first time the whole evening.

“The same software developers that Solo Corp. is famously wooing for a joint venture?” Rose brow rose practically ten feet. She must have mistaken Rey’s desperate look for confusion, because she shrugged and said, “What? I read the financial times. It’s not that hard.”

“He didn’t know that when he met him,” Ben said, and although Ben was a jerk and an asshole extraordinaire, he wasn’t a liar, which was one of the few good qualities Rey thought he possessed. “Poe was at a party, and one of the homeowners kids needed to go to the hospital, and that’s where he met Finn, the head pediatrician. They hit it off right away, apparently.”

“How sweet,” Rose cooed, and completely turned her body so she could pretend not to hear whatever retort Hux would have to that. “But the fact that Solo Communications is looking for someone to partner with on distance learning solutions for public universities didn’t hurt.”

“Not in the least,” Ben said without even flinching. Hux was launching into a story about how they had the good sense to dump their stock of their competitor’s and start buying up Sevin the moment Ben found out that Poe and Finn were dating, and how that got Finn’s father’s attention. A brilliant opening move in business, blah blah blah.

Rey tried. She really tried not to listen, to keep her head down and focus on the food, which she admitted was some of the best things she’d ever tried in Paris. The foie gras in the rilettes were there, but not overpowering, the salad Ben had chosen, while nondescript was fresh and crunchy. The entrecôte was perfectly cooked, soft but still juicy. But no matter how much she put in her mouth, it was like it simply passed through her, tasteless and flavor-free.

“I need to get some air,” Rey heard herself say a little louder than was polite, and the entire restaurant seemed to still at what they would have deemed an outburst. She managed to pull it together long enough to wipe her lips on a napkin and stand up. She was just about to turn and walk off, when she felt a hand grab her wrist. She turned and gasped, and Ben was holding her tiny wrist in his massive paw, like he’d known exactly what she was about to do.

“Let go of me,” Rey snapped at him, wriggling her wrist free of his grasp. He loosened his hold, but didn’t release just yet.

“Rey,” he said, and there was a brief second when a look of…something crossed his face. Was it compassion? Longing? Rey couldn’t tell, because it was gone the moment she recognized it, and she was starting at the cold, impassive face of Benjamin Solo again. “Don’t forget your jacket.”

She snatched it off the back of the chair and walked outside. Almost on cue, tears filled her eyes, in a way they hadn’t since she first arrived in Paris and missed home so much that it hurt.

She found herself by the Louvre, looking at the grand palace, the horribly out of place glass pyramid, heard the people moving around her. In the distance, someone was playing _La Vie en Rose_ on the violin. Then she kept walking, finding herself standing in the middle of the bridge nearest to the Louvre, staring at the dark waters of the Seine. She could still just hear the music, and watched the lights of the Louvre, the Musee D’ Orsay, and the river boats sparkling in the water.

She took in a deep breath. It was going to be okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing Ben Solo as an asshole is very difficult, okay. And yes, I realize Linus Larrabee never showed up in Paris in the start of the movie, but I felt it was important that the family cared enough about Rey to have someone go there and deliver the news of Poe's engagement to her. 
> 
> And I have to admit, it was fun revisiting Paris for a bit. <3 Also please note, all the French was done using Google Translate! C'est glauque was a line I borrowed from Nodame Cantabile, meaning "gloomy" or "off putting" haha.


	3. Chapter 3

It had been three weeks since Paris, and Benjamin Solo could not get Rey’s face out of his mind.

As it turned out, it was pretty hard to say something to someone knowing it was absolutely going to break their heart, and not remember what their face looked like after. But the family had unanimously decided (without Poe, obviously, because he _still_ didn’t know) that if anyone was going to tell Rey about the engagement, it was going to have to be Ben.

“Ben!” Poe’s voice caught the day after he came back from Paris, still jetlagged, and without sleep since that dinner and already leaving for work. His brother, with his perpetual perfect curls, was jogging toward him looking like a model for an athleisure/streetwear company, Summer 20xx. “I didn’t know you were back. You heading to work already?”

“Am I that obvious,” he deadpanned, looking down at his perfectly pressed work suit, his briefcase in hand to match his eyebags.

“You work too hard,” Poe chuckled, affable as always, twirling a tennis racket in his hand. “You and Mom.”

“Has it ever occurred to you that you’re an officer of the Solo Corporation, just like I am, just like mother and Han, even if he never acknowledges it,” he mumbled.

“I’ve heard that before, sure,” Poe nodded, his eyes getting that glazed over look it gets whenever Ben so much as brought up work.

“Our office address is 32 Sixth Avenue. Your office is right next to mine, and I am this close to tearing down that wall and converting it to an apartment so I don’t have to live with any of you anymore.”

“Don’t say that, Ben! You’ll miss me too much,” Poe pat his brother’s shoulder just as Leia emerged from the house, dressed just as work-appropriate as her son except where Ben was bogged down in mergers and meetings and financial reports, Leia was going to do the good work of distributing their funds to people who needed it more than they ever would. “Mother, you’re looking lovely today.”

“You’re looking well-rested, troublemaker,” Leia said, accepting a kiss on the cheek as Ben looked away uncomfortably.

“I was just going to say, Finn wanted to thank you for dinner last night,” Poe told her. Ben didn’t say this, but he actually liked Finn for his brother. Finn was incredibly loyal, sweet and was dedicated to his job. All the things that were good for Poe. “He also wanted to thank you for the Laduree macarons, Ben.”

“Rose Tico chose them, I’m just the messenger,” Ben said. Rose had indeed chosen the gift, a way for her to show that she was totally over Poe, and that things were fine.

But things weren’t fine, were they?

 _Let go of me,_ Rey had said, her eyes blazing with the seven fires of eternal damnation as she glared at him.

He sighed.

It wasn’t that Ben _liked_ being the bad guy. It was just that there was nobody else who was going to do it. That was his role in the family, wasn’t it? To be the one who did the work. The one who hunkered down and did whatever it takes to get the success his family deserved. Because if he wasn’t that, then what good was he? He was never going to be affable and brilliant like his father, or cunning and clever like his mother. He certainly wasn’t going to ever be as charming and carefree as Poe, or as unflappable as Luke.

“Are you sure you want to do it, Ben?” his mother had asked him, protective of his heart in ways that he had never learned how. “She could hate you.”

“You say that like I haven’t seen the face of someone the day we took over their entire business,” Ben chuckled darkly. “I know that look only too well. It’s fine. I’ll be the villain.”

Except it was three weeks later, and he was still thinking about it.

“Have a good day at work, guys. I didn’t know people still worked on Sundays,” Poe said as Leia got into the car, and Chewie was already warming up the engine.

“Poe dear. You’re sweet. But—

“It’s Wednesday,” Ben told his brother abruptly before he got into the car. He didn’t care that he was being an asshole, that he had huffed just a little bit. His family would be used to that. But as Chewie glanced at him through the rearview mirror, Ben wondered why he was feeling extra irate today. He had never been angry about his family’s choices, had never begrudged them of painting him the villain or the son that did all the work.

But today, he felt like he was holding Poe over the short end of the stick. And it wasn’t that he was his usual feeling of being frustrated or disappointed at him. No. He was mad at Poe, mad for being so blissfully unaware of how he made a certain girl in Paris feel. And it wasn’t his fault Rey never told him, but Ben hated having to be the one to pick up the pieces.

“Dollar for your thoughts, idiot child,” Leia said breezily, leaning against the arm of the chair to peer over at Ben, who was presently ignoring his buzzing phone. Hux was sending him updates on the Sevin deal, and it should be what occupied Ben’s mind now.

“Has anyone ever told you how sweet you are, mother,” he said sarcastically. She swatted his arm.

“You know you never told me or Luke about how it went with Rey, in Paris,” Leia said. “How did she take it?”

“She’ll be fine,” Ben told her. He realized he never told Chewie wither, even if he was sure Rey would have already called him if she needed confirmation. “She’s an adult. She’s going to have to learn how to handle disappointment.”

“You know I love her like the daughter I never had, and your father does too,” Leia mused. “We just want her to be happy.”

“Sending your son to break her heart because your other son broke her heart, and she wasn’t thrilled? The nerve,” Ben rolled his eyes.

“Oh stop it. She needed someone to be there for her, you know that.”

“I know,” Ben said. “I know.”

* * *

That was last week. And he would still be thinking about it, sitting in his home office, where he was supposed to be drafting the terms of his join venture agreement with Sevin Technologies. But he wasn’t. Mostly because there was an infernal racket going on outside, and he couldn’t focus.

Oof. Infernal racket. He was turning in to his father. Or his mother. He didn’t know which was worse.

“Threepio, what is going on out there?” He asked the stiff backed butler, who had been working for his family since long before Ben was born, who thought ‘retirement’ a dirty word.

“Oh, preparations are well underway for Master Poe and Finn’s engagement party tonight, sir,” He said, his English as British as ever, and stiff as a shirt. “I would have thought Mitaka would have it on your calendar.”

It made him think of the way Rey spoke, still with an accent, but the words softer, more natural, Americanized. The things she chose to say, though…

“He did. I must have been…distracted,” he mumbled, feeling a headache coming on. He’d been having those more and more frequently. And honestly, he didn’t think he would feel _so old_ at 33, but carrying the weight of an entire conglomeration of companies on your shoulders, making sure each and every person within was happy as a clam and given the best benefits they deserved, wasn’t easy.

But nobody else was going to do it.

“I’m leaving. Going to the office,” he announced, standing up suddenly and gathering his laptop and other documents on his desk, ignoring the fact that Threepio was here to deliver a tray of snacks he’d particularly ordered to help him hunker down and work.

“In Manhattan, sir?” Threepio asked like it was another one of the many dirty words in his vocabulary, following him out the door.

“Yes. No need to call Chewie, I can drive myself.”

“That’s fine sir, as he’s currently indisposed picking up Miss Rey at the station.”

He stopped, stilling his hands mid-arrangement of his stuff. “Miss Rey?”

“Yes, sir. The young woman who has been in residence with Sir Chewbacca since you were eighteen,” Threepio said, like it was perfectly normal that Ben completely forgot a whole other person who lived in the house. “Technically she is Master Luke’s ward.”

“I remember vaguely,” Ben said, because apparently sarcasm was the only language he was fluent in.

“She has been in residence in Paris for the last five years, and she is finally coming home today,” was that excitement he actually detected in Threepio’s voice? Astounding. “We are all quite excited to welcome her.”

“Good for her, then,” Ben said, finally leaving his office and heading int the direction of the garage.

“You’re leaving?” Han asked, his head peering out from the library of all places, where he was probably coming up with another one of his harebrained schemes for world domination. Honestly, Ben had no idea what his father did with his time between teaching economics at NYU and scamming his Upper East Side friends in a round of poker.

“Since when have you been interested in my comings and goings,” Ben asked, and he didn’t mean to make it sound flippant or rude, but it did anyway. And it told him a lot about how much better his relationship with his father was now that he said nothing, but just tilt his head at Ben and waited for him to continue.

“I’ll be back in time for the party tonight, jeez,” he assured his Dad, putting a jacket over his weekend shirt. It still had a collar, so it was going to be appropriate for the city.

He had just made it to the garage without the rest of his family at his heels, he was so relieved he felt like he could kiss his sleek, black TIE. He walked over to the key box to grab the keys when he saw Chewie yelling at the gardener about the proper care of the koi fish in the pond.

If Chewie was here, did that mean?

The sound of Poe’s X-Wing honking down the driveway gave him pause. The cherry red sports car (which made every man’s mid life crisis) pulled in practically in front of him, kicking up dust. But where Ben expected to see only his brother in another ideation of casual wear, he saw that the car was full, with Poe, Finn, his loyal but very temperamental Labrador retrieved Bibi and…Rey. Who had said dog practically snoozing on her lap.

He felt an inordinate amount of jealousy there.

“Are you sure this where you live?” Poe was asking, completely bewildered as the three of them simply hopped out of the car. Doors existed. Hello.

“For the good parts of my life, anyway,” Rey grinned, and the first thing Ben noticed was that she cut her hair. She had longish brown hair before, but now it was cut shorter, in a more severe, more chic style, but it suited her nonetheless. She was wearing jeans that looked like the hems were torn, a black shirt that would not have been amiss on a pirate, except she’d left three buttons open to expose her meager cleavage, and a pair of silver heels. She was wearing red lipstick as well.

Ben inhaled. It was a regular part of breathing, after all.

“They used to have lovely parties here,” she said, and her voice was so soft, so wistful.

“You’ve been to the parties here,” Poe said, wrinkling his brow and rubbing his chin as if he was still trying to place her. Ben rolled his eyes. “But I still can’t place you.”

“Tonight’s party will be my first,” Finn admitted. “But then again it’s our engagement party, so at least I’ll know Leia and Han and Ben.”

“And Poe?” Rey asked, laughing.

“Oh right. Poe too,” Finn said, and the two of them laughed like they had been friends for ten years instead of maybe five minutes.

“I take it your parents invited people you don’t know,” Rey pointed out.

“The hospital takes up most of my time,” Finn frowned. “I don’t really have a lot of friends.”

“You know, I could have sworn that I wouldn’t have forgotten a pretty face like yours,“ Poe was saying, walking up to her, getting _very_ close, Ben might add.

“Memory must be going in your age,” Rey laughed, and Ben couldn’t take this. Somehow, Poe had no idea who he was talking to.

“Oh, tell me about it,” Finn said, like he had no idea that his fiancee was very openly flirting with someone in his own driveway. “I’m kind of glad that between the two of us, I’m the doctor. Oh shit, speaking of,” he said, frowning as he brought out his ringing phone. He looked up at Poe, who looked at him like he knew it was a bad idea.

“Go, babe,” he said, smiling softly before Finn answered the call and walked away.

“He’s so sweet,” Rey told him, watching Finn walk off to answer the call.

“I like him,” Poe said, getting that goofy grin of his Ben had only ever seen him give Bibi, who was currently curling himself around Poe’s legs, then Rey’s then back to Poe’s. Ben had never hated the dog more. “You know you should come to the party tonight.”

A pause. Ben didn’t realize he was holding his breath until Rey spoke and he released it.

“Do you really want me to?” She asked, curiously.

“Yes,” Poe said a little too quickly. “Finn would love to have you. I know I would. Even if I have no idea who you are.”

Jesus christ. Ben had no problems with his brother being bisexual. Poe had the freedom to be whatever he wanted, and Ben was truly happy that Poe was never asked to be anything but who he was. But he was just such. a damn. flirt. He couldn't help it, the combination of Han Solo's charms and Leia Organa's keen observations of people, matched with their sharp tongues made Poe Dameron Solo irresistible when he turned on the charm. And that was exactly what Benjamin Solo, the one who inherited Leia's sharp mind for scheming and machinations, and Han Solo's shoot from the hip business sense, had to put a stop to. This was getting _ridiculous_. 

And what was Rey doing? The last time he saw Rey she was devastated over Poe's engagement. She never came back to dinner, and Rose and Hux and somehow left him by himself at that restaurant, wondering if she would ever come back. Now here she was in _that_ outfit, and that smile, and it was like that night had never happened in the first place. 

“Hello Rey,” he said, very purposefully walking past them on the guise of getting to his car, which to be fair, was right behind them.

“Rey?” Poe asked, shocked. 

“Hello, Ben,” She sniffed, looking a little annoyed as the realization set in for Poe. It almost made Ben laugh to see how the truth set in to his brother’s face, and how the confusion seemed to stay.

“Rey?” Poe echoed.

Ben was fully prepared to get into his car and drive to Manhattan in a spectacular mood and remember this moment for a few more days and lord it over Poe’s head (he was an older brother, it was natural to him) when Poe just had to go ruin the fucking moment.

“Rey?” He repeated.

“Yes, Rey,” Ben said, holding up his keys and unlocking the car door. Then to her, he said, “I hope your flight was okay.”

“It was fine,” she said, already going back to the car to retrieve her bags. “There was a pain in the ass on my last day, but it’s fine. I have to find Chewie.”

“I guess we’ll see you tonight,” Poe said, still just as dazed as Ben felt. “Nine o’ clock?”

“Nine o’ clock!” Rey yelled over her shoulder, jogging off in the direction of the staff quarters. Ben watched her go, but also saw the way Poe was practically spilling hearts out of every bodily orifice.

“Poe,” he said in a warning voice. His brother looked at him like he’d completely forgotten that Ben was there. “No.”

“What?”

“No.”

“I have to go back to the hospital,” Finn said, coming back to where the brothers were staring at each other. “There’s a strain of strep throat going around and they need me to be on call tonight. I know it’s our engagement party, and I really was looking forward to it…”

“It’ll be fine, babe,” Poe said, his voice warm and low and deep, and Ben wasn’t used to his brother being so soothing as he kissed his fiancee and gave him a reassuring hug. “We never run out of parties here. Right Ben?”

“Right,” Ben said, and suddenly he was the uncomfortable one, for intruding on what was clearly a tender, private moment. He had never been privy to one of those, and he did not want to start now. “I can drive you back to the city, Finn.”

The brothers exchanged one last warning glare at each other before they went their separate ways.

* * *

“REY NIIMA IS THAT REALLY YOU!”

Rey nearly jumped out of her skin as the American Maz Kanata (who knew it was such a common name?) practically leapt up from her seat when Rey walked in to the staff quarters. She hugged the cook tightly, and felt her heart start to writhe in her chest in a way she hadn’t allowed herself to before. When she’d arrived on the bus earlier today, the first thing she’d seen was Poe and Finn, holding hands and whispering to each other as they walked out of an ice cream store, Bibi hot on their heels.

They had looked so sweet. But Poe had stopped for one second, and he’d seen her, and Rey couldn’t help herself and said “hi.”

Then because Finn was obviously the nicest person in the world, he started talking to her, and talking to her ended up in a ride home while Poe wracked his brain to try to figure out who she was. Until of course, Ben Solo had to ruin it all. Jerk.

“MAZ!! I have _so_ many gifts for you!” Rey exclaimed, helping Artoo bring in her bags. Who would have thought she accumulated so much stuff in Paris. “I found a Middle Eastern place that sold really good saffron for an a good price, and I thought you would want to experiment with adding it to your paella. Then a French cookbook, because I know you wanted to learn, and I can teach you…”

“Miss Rey!” Threepio exclaimed, walking stiffly in to the quarters from the main house. “Oh it is lovely to see you again.”

“Threepio!” Rey exclaimed, throwing her arms around him in a hug that was highly inappropriate in the man’s view, but he returned it, if a bit stiffly. “I bought you a hat. A proper one with the tall edges and a really good, stiff brim so you’ll feel fancy on your days off.”

“Anything in there for me?” Chewie massive frame filled up the doorway, and the floodgates of Rey’s heart just shattered open. Tears filled her eyes as she barelled into her foster father and threw her arms around him, and he lifted her up like she was still ten years old, spinning her as she hugged him. She was home. Everyone she loved was here. It was easier to admit now that there was some part of Rey’s brain that would feel like a stranger to this place. But home was always going to be home, and she didn’t have to worry.

“I didn’t buy you anything,” She joked, wiping her eyes as she retrieved her carry on bag, where she’d been carrying gifts for Chewie, Luke, Han and Leia, one as precious as the other.

“I’m glad you’re home,” He told her, lowering her to the floor. “You picked a good day too, smack dab in the middle of party planning at the house.”

“Oh, speaking of, I have to stream my dress!” Rey exclaimed, which was a sentence she never thought she would ever say in this house, but she wasn’t exactly the same dirt-nosed little girl that left Long Island, was she?

She picked up the one garment bag she had carefully tucked in between her things and held up the gown. Thrifted clothes and film were the only two things Rey splurged on when she was in Paris, and this dress had been a solid gold find. It had been buried in a trunk in the thrift store she had been working in, a donation from an old woman who recently sold her house in Marais. And while Rey never had a reason or occasion to wear a gown like this, she hadn’t been able to resist, and purchased it before the owner could properly tell what it was.

She hadn’t wanted to spend the money, but Rose had taken one look at it and shook her head.

“You know when we were kids and we had that fantasy of going to a Solo party?” Rose asked her. “That’s the dress I picture you wearing.”

“Your dress?” Chewie asked in confusion, taking her right back to present day Long Island, following her up the stairs to her room, which had remained largely untouched since she left. Rey pulled out the dress from the bag and hung it up.

“Wow! Did Paris turn you into Cinderella somehow?” Maz asked, her brows lifting at the sight. Even Rey had to pause to sigh and lovingly admire it.

It was vintage Givenchy, and it was a beautiful strapless white dress, and a sumptuous floral pattern embroidered in a deep shimmery navy thread on the stiff bodice and the base of the skirt. The dress was almost ostentatious with its train, the bottom of which also held the same floral pattern. But the skirt was cut in front to reveal a fit skirt that made it more exciting.

It didn’t impress Chewie, though.

“Why do you need a dress like _that_?”

“Because I’m attending the ball,” Rey shrugged, pulling her bags into the room, opening it up and already looking for the right shoes. The dress cut off at her ankle, a bit of an awkward length, but with the right shoes, it would be fine. “Poe invited me.”

“You have been holding out on us, Regina!” Maz gasped, completely in raptures as she helped Rey look for shoes. Rey didn’t actually know if Regina was her full name, it was just the name Maz assigned to her. Chewie was still not impressed. “He really invited you to the ball?”

“Well, he didn’t exactly know it was me, and Finn was there, so I’m sure it was just a friendly gesture…”

“Oh HUSH. You will blow the Solo boys away tonight, I just know it.”

And if Rey’s face flinched at the collective name for the two brothers, she didn’t let it show. But she turned to Chewie, and he was still giving her that look like he had half a mind to lock her in her room tonight.

“Please,” Rey heard herself say to him. “I’ve seen those parties from a distance, and I promised myself that just _once,_ I wanted to be a part of it. And now I was invited, and I…I want to go.”

“You know I would never stop you,” he sighed. “But it’s their world, Rey. It’s always going to be their world.”

“Don’t listen to the old man,” Maz huffed, ushering him out the door. “You and I need to discuss what we’re going to do about your hair.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact! The actual Givenchy x Edith Head dress that Audrey Hepburn wore was found in one of Debbie Reynold's trunks when the archivist was going through her and Carrie's collection of movie memorabilia for auction. There wasn't a master list of what they had or didn't have, so it was a lovely surprise. 
> 
> And in other notes, a new job (just for the duration of the lockdown!) has kept me busy as of late, but I'm one chapter ahead, so hopefully we can keep things constant? I hope you're all doing well. Wash your hands!


	4. Chapter 4

It was the perfect night for an engagement party. Except of course, one of grooms wasn’t there. But, as a way to ingratiate himself with the Solos, Finn announced that he would not stand for the family canceling the party just because of him, and things went on as scheduled. As Rey had suspected when she first met him, Finn was a wonderful, wonderful man.

But then again, parties at the Solo house weren’t really about what the occasions were supposed to be, but the grand spectacle of the party. Rey walked down the all too familiar path from the staff quarters to the back garden, tracing steps she used to take five years ago, with much the same feelings of excitement and bursting happiness. As she reached the tree, the little old tree she loved to climb, she smiled, and took one step away from it. Then another, and another, until the music swelled and she was in the party. Her vintage dress felt a little bit out of place among the Nordstrom dresses and Louboutin shoes, but she didn’t much care now that she was here.

She took a deep breath in, and a deep breath out. She was nervous as hell. But she looked up, realized that Poe, who was standing in a throng of very old people, was smiling at her.

She smiled back, and stepped into the party. The music seemed a little louder, the lights a little brighter and the crowd a little thicker. Watching from a tree seemed much easier than this.

“Rey!” Rose’s voice filled her ears, and she hugged her friend like they hadn’t spent the last five years together. Rose had actually come home earlier, making a stop over in London for a week for a possible job. But she was here now, looking stunning in a mermaid dress and with her hair tucked all on one side. “You look _amazing._ And I knew that dress was meant for you!”

“You look amazing too,” Rey smiled, because it was the honest to god truth. “Hot date?”

“Ummmmm,” Rose said, looking away from Rey awkwardly when a familiar shadow with ginger hair approached with two champagne glasses.

“Champagne, darling?”

“Really?” Rey exclaimed in surprise, unable to contain the laughter that bubbled up inside her. To be fair, both Rose and Armitage turned the deepest shades of red, almost like they were both embarrassed that this was going on, which only made them more adorable.

“So guess who I met up with in London,” Rose said, accepting the glass.

“Yes, and it only took all of her convincing prowess to wear me down,” Hux said, and it was probably the nicest thing Rey had ever heard him say to her. But Rose scoffed and shook her head.

“Which one of us begged the other not to go back to the US?”

“Which one of us was waiting at the airport when I arrived?”

“You guys are too cute,” Rey laughed, shaking her head. It was good to see Rose so happy. She deserved it. She didn’t really take too well to Paige moving to California permanently, especially since she’d been in Paris at the time. But if Armitage was going to stick around, and she was happy, then Rey was happy for her too.

“Rey,” Poe’s voice came up behind her, and she whirled around to see him grinning at her. “You look beautiful.”

“Thanks,” Rey smiled, and she felt eighteen years old again, dreaming up this exact scenario. But this wasn’t a dream at all, because Dream Rey would never have all of these nervous butterflies fluttering in her stomach, making her two wrong breaths away from throwing up.

“Finn asked me to save my first dance for you,” he said, holding a hand up for her, which she happily accepted. Poe led her to the dance floor, the both of them gliding almost effortlessly as he signaled the bandleader. Then, as they had been cued, the band began to play a lovely _La Vie en Rose._

“I’ve always wondered how you did that,” Rey chuckled, letting Poe take her into his arms and move her around the parquet floors like they were the only two people in the room.

“A little bribery and a lot of practice,” he grinned, and he was so charming Rey wanted to hug him, and they continued to dance.

“I like Finn. He seems really sweet,” Rey told him as he twirled her with a hand, leading her without her realizing that he was doing so.

“He doesn’t have a single bad bone in his body, that guy,” Poe chuckled. “Some days I feel completely unworthy of him. And I worry that one day he’ll wake up and see right through me.”

“I’m sure that’s not possible,” Rey frowned.

“Look at me, Rey. I’m a mess,” Poe’s laugh was self-deprecating, and Rey realized she’d never heard him like this. Her heart squeezed in her chest for him. “I’m celebrating my engagement party without the man I love, and I’m dancing with the girl from the garage.”

“And that’s a bad thing,” Rey said sharply, stopping them both. Poe shook his head.

“No. Just unlikely,” he assured her. How ironic that right now would have been the perfect time to tell him the things she accidentally told Ben five years ago— _I think you’re wonderful and generous, and incredibly funny…_ but decided against it. That wasn’t what he needed to hear.

_Just know that someone is thinking of you from far away._

She told him about Paris, instead, how much she loved the Musee D’ Orsay, how she would walk the Jardin du Luxembourg and sit on the grass when the sun was out. He told her about racing yachts in Miami, learning how to speak Spanish when he spent a gap year in Guatemala.

“I want to talk to you a little more,” he said, sighing that lovely sigh of his, and she felt her body relax around him too.

“We’re talking now,” Rey chuckled, feeling dizzy and drunk with happiness.

“Away from everything,” Poe clarified, shaking his head. “I feel like I never truly saw you, Rey. Not until today.”

Then the music stopped.

“Poe?” A voice asked in the distance. “Poe Dameron Solo, is that you?”

He sighed, his brows furrowing.

“So in demand,” Rey teased.

“They’re Mom’s friends. I really should…” he said hesitantly.

“Go,” she smiled at him. “I’ll be fine.”

“Meet me in the solarium in ten minutes,” he whispered, placed a quick kiss on her cheek, and went to greet Leia’s friends, Amilyn and Mon, leaving Rey alone.

 _Ten minutes,_ she told herself, taking a deep breath. _You can be on your own for ten minutes._

She walked over to the buffet, the most important spot in the whole room, watching Rose and Hux pretend they weren’t terribly in love with each other as they danced. They reminded Rey of a stiff-backed general and an an empress trying to decide if they were going to kiss or assassinate the other in a ball. Damn it, she wished she had her camera, or her phone, but she didn’t have a purse small enough to fit her phone, and it just didn’t feel right bringing a camera to such an intimate event.

“Did you have the shrimp? They say the shrimp is particularly excellent tonight,” Rey heard Luke before she even saw him, and it was very new for her to see him all dressed up for a party. He even trimmed his beard.

“Luke!” Rey exclaimed, hugging him, because apparently, she was full of hugs tonight. “You’re here!”

“I’m making nice for the nephews,” he grinned like he was letting Rey in on a secret, which was why she always liked talking to him. “Nephew one is busy trying to take over the world.”

He nudged his head in the direction of the main house, where from the window, Rey could clearly see Ben in a suit wearing some kind of headset and having a video chat with another serious looking person, with a large group of people who all looked like they were CEOs in the room looking contemplative.

“Very busy indeed,” Rey said. Just the sight of Ben Solo made her stomach twist even worse than when she first arrived at the party. She didn’t like it one bit.

“And Nephew Two is trying very hard not to flirt with you,” Luke added, and Rey immediately flushed at the insinuation. “I think he’s failing.”

“Luke, I really don’t think—“

But Rey was cut off by the change of music. She knew this song so well that she knew in the first two notes what was going on. _Maybe the Night._

Their eyes met across the room, and she knew. Her heart swelled in her chest, because they had them play _this_ song, for her. So many of Rey’s fantasies had been of this exact moment, of Poe looking at her with a shy but knowing smile. That smile that said, “meet me in the Solarium.”

He nudged his head in the direction of the place. Rey nodded.

“Luke, I—“ she trailed off.

“I’ll see you later, kid,” he said, giving Rey a dismissive nod as she turned and walked to the direction of the Solarium, and Poe headed to the champagne table. He would smile at Artoo because Artoo was his accomplice in these things, be handed two crystal flutes, which he would put in the pockets of his pants. Then he would be handed a bottle of champagne, and Poe would whip out the glasses at just the right moment.

The music followed Rey to the solarium, distant enough that it felt like a dream. The Solarium was one of her favorite rooms in the house, half ballroom, half garden, with a patterned floor perfect for dancing, and plants that made the place feel intimate and cozy, especially at night. As the music played, so did she, humming along, spinning around in her dress, laughing and for once in her life, enjoying being a part of a dream.

She would remember this night for the rest of her life, she knew, and Poe hadn’t even shown up yet.

She heard the sounds of clinking behind her, and she turned, smiling. Only to have that smile falter.

“Ben?”

Rey had been mid-twirl when she was called, and so was slightly dizzy when she saw Benjamin Solo walk through the door of the Solarium, a contrast to his brother in a dark black suit, and a bottle of champagne in his hands, the glasses in between his massive fingers. Rey gasped, and she didn’t know why.

“Hello, Rey.”

She placed a hand over her chest, a little breathless from all her imaginary dancing. Heat rose up her cheeks, but she refused to acknowledge the embarrassment, given the last time she was in the same room with him.

“I thought you were Poe.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” he said, and was it just her, or did he really sound sorry? Maybe all that spinning had made her disoriented. She certainly felt it. Because the music, and in fact, the whole romantic setting of the solarium seemed to fall away from the rest of the world. “He’s not coming.”

“Oh,” Rey blinked, looking around. Her dream was getting derailed a bit. “What happened?” And she made sure he didn’t hear the fear and desperation in her voice. _Did he never plan on coming? Did he leave her intentionally? Did he not like her enough to show up?_

“He sat on a champagne flute.”

He sounded completely serious, and it would sound reassuring if it didn’t sound so absurd. But Ben wasn’t a liar. He would rather tell a joke than tell a lie. Maybe. Rey didn’t really know.

“Is he okay?” She heard herself laugh, because this wasn’t part of the dream, and perhaps she was spiraling a little.

“It was a very sharp flute,” he said, quick as a whip, and Rey couldn’t help it. She laughed even louder. And she was so distracted that she didn’t realize that Ben had placed his little gifts on a little table until he managed to pop the champagne and she screamed in surprise. “He’s in the emergency room.”

“Shouldn’t you be with him?” She asked. _Should_ I _be with him?_

“He asked me to go to you. So you didn’t feel…abandoned,” Ben said, and if Rey didn’t know him any better (and she didn’t), it seemed like he was trying to be reassuring.

Rey released a slow, shaky breath. Ben (or Poe?) hit the nail on the head on her erratic emotions.

“He’ll be fine. An extraction, a few stitches. You’ll see him tomorrow,” he handed her a glass of fizzy champagne on a crystal flute, his eyes never leaving hers for a second as she accepted her glass. Rey still couldn’t hear the music, couldn’t hear the little fountain nearby. “He asked me to take care of you.”

Something about the way he said that, and the unnerving feeling that crept up her arms rubbed Rey the wrong way. She looked at Ben again, so tall, so mysterious. He had lovely eyes too, she realized. It was just as bright and sparkling as his brother’s, but Ben was more guarded, more serious.

She remembered seeing him in Paris, the way he’d dealt with her. What Rose had said about the Solos needing the Sevins for a business deal that hinged on Poe and Finn getting married. And Rey was in the way of that.

“Oh,” Rey said as she took a sip of her drink, and realization sunk in like the bubbles in her stomach. “You’re trying to deal with me again. But this time, there’s no dinner.”

“I thought you didn’t like that I bought you dinner,” he said, and she hated that he didn’t deny it. But then again, she wouldn’t have appreciated him sugarcoating this, either.

“I’ve seen this k-drama, you know,” she said, still holding her champagne as she stepped away from him, her dress fanning around her as she turned. “They send a family member to the unsuitable girl. They tell her why she isn’t worthy of their son. ‘He’s the heir to an empire, you’re…you’re a little street rat someone’s uncle picked up.’” She was so proud of herself that her voice didn’t break. “‘I’m sure you’re a good girl, but here’s a discreet envelope of a hundred thousand dollars to go away and never speak to their son again. She says no. The mother says—“

“Five hundred thousand,” he said without flinching, without looking at all nervous or apologetic.

“No,” Rey’s voice wavered only a little. His bluntness was staggering sometimes.

“One million dollars,” he continued, and she still didn’t know if he was serious or sarcastic. He took a sip of his drink. So did she.

“No self respecting Korean mother would offer less,” he added, and she still couldn’t tell if he was joking.

“No self respecting heroine would accept,” she sniffed.

“Good girl,” he said, and there was the tiniest of grins playing on his lips. Who would have thought, Ben Solo had dimples.

Whirling away and taking her glass with her. She heard him put his flute down on the table, heard the sound of his Italian leather shoes follow her cheap heels on the patterned floor. She was sufficiently confused, and just a little tired. She was still on Paris time, or maybe her body was now completely confused as to what time it actually was.

“Do you love him?” She heard him ask, far enough that the could hear him talk, close enough that she didn’t feel like she was alone.

“I think I’ve loved him all my life,” Rey said, a hint of sadness in her voice, because she was stating a thing that was simply a fact. “He made me feel like I belonged in this house.”

“You didn’t feel like that when you first came?”

“I don’t know,” Rey sighed, and her feet were starting to kill her, so she took off her shoes and carefully put them to one side. “I’ve tried very hard to forget those first few years of my life, and my brain just…blocked everything out. It still follows me around, as you know. I’ve been far away in Paris, and yet some days I still feel like that little girl Luke found in an old car in a junkyard.”

“And Poe doesn’t make you feel like that?”

“He treats me like I’m just another girl,” Rey felt the smile creep up on her face when she said that. She looked over her shoulder at Ben. “You don’t agree.”

Not that she was looking for his agreement, of course.

He was much closer than she thought he was. Rey stopped in her walk, and Ben approached her slowly, cautiously. She felt tiny when she stood before him, and her heart was beating like mad in her chest, her grip on her champagne glass loose and easy. She wasn’t scared of him, or worried at all. He made her feel…safe.

“No,” He murmured. “You’re lovely. And when you came, it was like a sweet breeze had swept through the house. Everyone was happier to have you.”

“Even if the breeze came from the general direction of a junkyard in the desert?” Rey asked.

He said nothing in reply. Rey didn’t know if it was because he disagreed, or he just didn’t want to dignify her answer with a response. He was just so…confusing.

“I just wanted one night,” Rey sighed. “One night in my life where I would dance in this solarium with Poe, that he would look at me with that look he gives all those other girls. I just…I want to be wanted like that. Just one night.”

He held up his now free hands, as if expecting her to just walk into them and dance. She looked at him skeptically. He shrugged in a way that reminded her so much of his father that it made her smile. He would hate that.

“It’s all in the family,” he pointed out, taking her hands and moving along to the music with her, even if she couldn’t quite hear it still. The music had changed, and Rey could hear it now. _Quando, Quando, Quando_ was unexpected, but more than welcome. He was a beat slower than the song dictated, but Rey preferred it this way.

“You smell nice,” she begrudgingly admitted, because he did. He smelled like warm, cozy nights by the fire and things that were freshly cleaned. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you dance before.”

“I’m very good at it. Clearly,” he said, his brow quirking, and damn it. He made her laugh.

“All those parties I watched from the tree, and I never saw you dance once,” Rey realized, all too aware of the way his giant hand dwarfed hers, how they were almost cheek to cheek, except he was incredibly tall, so it was more chin to top of head. The hand on the small of her back was weighty and warm. “I have definitely never seen you take a girl to the solarium, and I’ve heard that this was a classic Solo move.”

“You shouldn’t believe everything Han tells you,” Ben said in response, and she was so close to him that she heard the laugh rumble in his chest. “I haven’t really met anyone I wanted to dance with before.”

“Or, you’ve never _had_ to dance with anyone here before,” Rey said, because she was just acknowledging the truth, that he was sent here to tell her to stay away from Poe, because he was happily engaged to someone else. “Because you’ve never done anything that you’ve never _had_ to do,” the rebuke was gentle, but she knew that he knew that it was true. “Ben Solo, the boy who never set a foot wrong.”

“Ben Solo, the boy who only wanted to dance with you,” he said, and he was really smiling now, and Rey’s heart was actually fluttering, for fuck’s sake. And he bent his head down and he kissed her, and she nearly dropped her champagne glass. But he kissed so well, and her insides were melting, and this was so, so wrong.

“What was that,” she gasped as she jumped back, and he seemed to be totally confused was well, but because Ben was Ben, it only took him a second to recover.

“Part of the message from Poe,” he said, and Rey couldn’t help herself. She slapped him across the face. He recoiled, she’d hit him just a bit harder than she intended, but she didn’t exactly regret it. Ben could be cold and stoic sometimes, but he was never a _total_ jackass.

“Do you really think so low of your bother that he would do that to Finn?” She asked him. Oh god, her hand print was on his face, bright and red and angry. Ben’s face shuttered, like he’d retreated into himself. It was his own damn fault.

“Maybe it would be better for you to get your messages in person next time,” he said, rubbing his cheek. Well, not rubbing. Caressing, maybe. “And thank you. I think I needed that.”

“Um. Anytime,” Rey said, holding up her flute of champagne to him. “There’s not much, but…”

He took it, raised the glass to her and swallowed. She thought he would press it to his cheek to cool the slap. He frowned, almost like he was upset with her. Or himself. It could have gone either way.

“You’ll see my brother tomorrow,” he assured her, his face remained distant, like it did before this whole thing started. Not that Rey remembered exactly when that happened. “Goodnight, Rey.”

There it was again, that goodnight. The last thing he said to her before she left for five years. Rey watched him go, taking the champagne and both flutes with him, leaving her in the solarium barefoot, a little tipsy, with a stinging hand and slightly kissed lips. She’d danced with someone who wanted to dance with her, and she was in a beautiful dress.

Dreams did come true after all. But life was still a little bitch, and didn’t give exactly what you wanted it to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, Harrison Ford's acting at this part was so damn charming and distracting, I almost forget that he's wearing a dorky bowtie, and Julia Ormond is in a gown that is so 1995 that Givenchy must have cried a little at the missed opportunity. But this was one of my favorite scenes! 
> 
> I am also trying SO HARD to make Poe *not* an asshole. Greg Kinnear made David seem so charming. These boys will be the death of me.


	5. Chapter 5

When Ben emerged from the solarium, he realized he was short of breath. His cheek still stung, and his hands were shaking, even as they held on to the champagne and glasses. He left those to a passing waiter and ran a hand over his lips, his breathing shaky.

He was an idiot. And a liar. Poe didn’t exactly _ask_ him to take care of Rey.

The whole thing had been a calculated risk, and Ben was very good at that sort of thing. Earlier in the evening, Leia had spotted her errant son dancing a little too close with Rey at the party, and it had been a little more embarrassing because Finn’s mother had seen it first, and asked, “who is that, dancing with Poe?” and Leia quickly explained that Rey was a childhood friend, almost like a sister, but the of course, Finn’s mother had huffed and pointed out that she would never look at her siblings like _that_.

“Good for you,” Leia had said. “I one kissed my twin brother on the lips, and we’re fine.”

Leia had pulled Ben aside (just as he was about to beg off of the party) and asked him to talk to his brother about his deportment just as _Maybe The Night_ played. Now Ben wasn’t an idiot. He knew Poe’s Big Move when he heard it, and righr on cue, he saw Poe move toward the champagne table.

Leia was raring to tell off her son for his behavior. Ben wanted to get the hell out of there. Observing the potential risks of Leia berating Poe in the middle of his own engagement party and Ben never hearing the end of it (because, hello, Bad Guy), he dragged his entire family to his home office instead.

“I don’t see what the problem is, I was just being friendly!” Poe explained, turning away from them to put his champagne bottle down. Ben, noted the bulge on the backs of Poe’s pants.

He knew exactly what to do.

“If I ever caught your father being that friendly with another woman—“

“You would have kicked me out of the house years ago,” Han added, grinning. Leia rolled her eyes but squeezed her husband’s arm in almost begrudging affection. Ben hated the little pang he got in his chest seeing that interaction, but he didn’t want to have to deal with that at the moment.

“Come on guys. It’s _Rey._ I’ve known her since she was a kid.”

“And yet you’ve never looked at her or danced with her like this before,” Leia pointed out, again making an excellent point.

“Are you saying that I’m a predator?”

“I’m saying, you don’t flirt with your childhood friend in front of your fiancee’s parents!”

“What about giving me the benefit of the doubt?”

Poe and Leia were full on arguing now. Let it never be said that a Solo backed down from an argument. So Han turned to Ben, because it was just about time for him to act his part in this little farce.

“Poe,” Ben finally said, his voice making sure there was no room for argument. “Sit down.”

And that was all it took. Poe was too huffy and annoyed (and a tad guilty) to not sit down without a flourish, which only made the crunch of the champagne glasses extra painful. Ben had winced, Leia had gasped, Han winced even harder. Poe screamed and look like he was about to pass out from the pain, but Ben but was able to extract from his brother the thing he had been waiting for.

“Rey,” he said to Ben, caught in a storm of pain as Leia freaked and called the doctor, and Han searched fo the nearest whiskey bottle, because drinking was always the answer. “In the solarium…”

“I’ll take care of her,” Ben had promised, nodding. Let it never be said that a Solo betrayed his promises.

That was hours ago now. And Rey had been…

Ben stumbled through the remnants of the engagement party, saying goodnight to the last of the stragglers, asking Snap Wexley how he’d fared at the poker game, promising he would join next time (he never did), saying goodnight to Amylin Holdo and Mon Mothma, nodding vaguely to the Canadys. Just as he was out of earshot of eveyone, Ben dialled a number.

“What?” Hux’s voice was irritable, and Ben could hear the sounds of giggling in the background. He immediately winced. “Solo?”

Technically, Ben was Hux’s boss, but Hux was technically also off the clock tonight, so Ben was going to let this slide. For now.

“I’m staying out here for a few days,” he said, already thinking about the three meetings he needed to reschedule, the catch-ups and the reports that would fall behind if he did this. What was he doing? Why was he doing this? He seriously didn’t know.

*Ben Solo, the boy who never set a foot wrong, * Rey had teased. It was the most accurate description of him that he’d heard so far. And Ben liked that he never set a foot wrong, that he never made mistakes. He wasn’t allowed to, but he was never angry about that. Well. Not never.

Sometimes he imagined what it would be like if he’d followed Rey out of that restaurant in Paris, had talked to her more the night he found her in Poe’s room. Those things were the wrong things to do, just like this was.

But this time, he was perfectly content making the wrong choice.

* * *

“Did the Sevins say anything about last night?” Ben asked, walking in to his parents’ massive bedroom the next morning, where Leia was already sitting in front of her vanity, brushing her long locks of already greying hair. Han was still in bed, his hair sticking up, his face still slightly swollen from sleep. He merely groaned at his son as if to say, ‘sure, Ben, come in, I totally want you here to witness me having a bitch of a hangover.’

“Is he okay?” Ben raised a brow at his mom, nudging his head in the direction of his father.

“I have yet to give him his first ibuprofen, let him be,” Leia waved him off. “And no, they didn’t, thank god. But I’m sure they’re going to make sure Finn hears about it. I’m sure the boys’ relationship is stable, but…”

“Three engagements,” Ben nodded, reading his mother’s mind exactly. Han used to joke that Ben was more Leia’s kid than Han’s, and Ben had always seen that. His mother understood him, understood his drive, and she had always gently led him on the right paths. But then some days she would tut and shake her head and comment that Ben was a Solo through and through, and he had no idea if that was a compliment or not.

Ben had been up since five am, going through his usual exercise routine in the asscrack of dawn. He was the kind of guy who stuck to a routine, and he liked to think that the results spoke for themselves. He was not the kind of guy who worried about hisnown plans, or stressed about billion dollar deals slipping theough his fingers because of a girl in a white dress. Definitely not. “Don’t worry, Mom. I have a plan.”

“Your brother is fine, by the way,” Han finally said, getting out of bed, and brushing aside Ben’s attempts to help him. “He’s in his room, stitches in his ass and all. Knocked out by a nice little painkiller. I could use one of those myself.”

“How about you have breakfast before you go looking for drugs, honey?” Leia called after him the same time Ben said, “I knew that before you did, who do you think arranged for the nurse by his door?”

“Leave me alone,” Han almost groaned as he retreated to the bathroom. Leia held back a laugh as Ben shook his head at his father.

“I don’t like this,” Leia sighed, putting the brush down as Ben stood behind her, frowning at his outfit, trying to get his hair just right. Why could his hair never be just right? “Maybe I should just talk to Rey, you know. Woman to woman. Tell her that I love my idiot son, but that Poe would fall in love with a paper clip if it looked just right. Oh god, can I say that to her? I can tell her about going out with Han and doing weed at the Yub Nub Club in the seventies, but I can’t tell her that?”

“Yub Nub…?”

“Why yes, Benjamin. You see in the seventies, your father and I would go to this place called a club and we’d…”

“Mother,” he said sternly, sounding exactly like her when he said that, he knew. “I can handle this, don’t worry. When is Finn due back from California?”

“Thursday. I think that’s what Poe said. Should he be back sooner? The man should probably know that his fiancee’s tush is going to be out of commission for a while.”

“MOM,” Ben said at the same time Han yelled, “LEIA” from the bathroom. It wasn’t even ten in the morning, and already Ben could feel a tension headache coming on. The rest of his thirties was going to be a breeze, he just knew it.

“I don’t want Finn to come back too soon, it will risk Poe getting scared and breaking the engagement,” Ben said, frowning at his reflection again. He wasn’t sure this whole sweater look was for him, but then again, he didn’t really have anything else casual in his wardrobe. He’d never needed it before. He sighed. This was going to have to be good enough.

“I like Rey. I always have,” and wasn’t that the truth? He liked their conversation yesterday, like that she seemed to be one of the few people on the planet that wasn’t afraid of him. “But I’m not going to pass up a billion dollars, and a chance to get this program into public universities, no matter how beautiful she is.”

Both Han and Leia seemed to pause, and communicate with each other from across their room with just their eyes, like Ben had just said something particularly interesting. Ben hated it when his parents did that. but knowing them, they were going to make sure it bit him in the ass later, and left the room instead, heading downstairs with the full intention of going to the servants quarters. He pulled continually at the hem of his black sweater, ran his hands through his hair, wondering when casual clothing felt so uncomfortable.

He was just about to exit through the side door when he ran into Rey, but he managed to catch her just in time for the door to whack him on the back of the head.

“Ow,” he said, wincing, as Rey quickly got over her shock and smiled at him. She looked good today, wearing a pair of denim shorts, a button down shirt that was in a lighter, thinner denim, and a pair of tennis shoes that had flowers printed on them. Ben used to be a big fan of Snoopy when he was a kid, and she reminded him a bit of Sally Brown, or Peppermint Patty, while he was Linus with the blanket, or maybe Pigpen with those lines of dirt and confusion constantly hovering over his face.

Jesus christ. He ran a multi-billion dollar group of companies, and all he could use to describe Rey Niima was a Snoopy analogy.

“Hey,” She smiled like she could pluck the thought right from his head, and moved so he would drop his arms. “I thought I would go up and see your brother. Chewie said that he was discharged this morning.”

“I was just about to take you to him, actually,” Ben said, and that was true. “He’s just upstairs. His room.”

“I think we both know that I know the way,” Rey pointed out, and Ben remembered the night she thought she was talking to someone who would listen, someone who would understand. Someone who could love her the way she deserved to be loved. But instead, she got him. And he was sorry for it.

“Still,” he said. “I’ll take you to him.”

* * *

Rey wasn’t sure what to expect when she followed Ben up the wooden staircase to Poe’s room. She’d gotten stitches before. She was twelve, and she’d hit her head on a rake after she’d landed in the wrong spot after climbing up a particularly tall tree. It had hurt like a bitch, and the tetanus shot had been worse. But getting hit by a rake was completely different from having glass embedded into your backside, apparently because Poe Dameron Solo was knocked the fuck out.

He looked really comfortable and sweet, lying facedown in bed like that, a blissed out little smile on his face as his curls looked rumpled, and his face slightly swollen from napping too hard. There was a bit of dried drool on the corner of his mouth.

“Wow, he’s…” Rey said, tentatively approaching him while Ben stood by the bed, his hands in the pockets of his jeans (jeans!), his brows furrowed as he watched his brother. “He’s really out. Do you think he can hear me?”

“POE!” Ben yelled suddenly, making both Rey and the nurse jump.

“I don’t think…”

“Reyyyyy,” Poe said, smiling still as he peeked up from his pillow, wincing a little as he seemed to recall what situation he was in. He reached out, and Rey approached him, kneeling by the bed. Poe placed both his hands on Rey’s cheeks, and she blinked back at him. Holy shit. She’d never been this close to him. “Hiiiiie.”

“Hi,” Rey giggled. “are you okay?”

“Muy, muy muuuuy bien,” he rumbled sleepily. “Donde es el platano?”

“A banana?” Ben asked from where he was standing, and Rey fought the urge to laugh. The poor man really was out of it.

“Ah Ben,” he said, turning slightly where Ben was. “Tu mierda. Te quiero.”

And the brief embarrassment that flooded Ben Solo’s face made the entire trip upstairs worth it for Rey, because Ben was forced to stammer for a second before muttering back, “yeah, yeah, love you too, Poe.”

“We should let him sleep,” Rey said, taking his hands and easing them away from her face. “Get a little more rest.”

“Thanks Mommy, you’re the best,” Poe muttered before finally resting his head back on the pillow. Rey stood up and turned to Ben, who was speaking to the nurse about getting his brother bananas. Rey, who had a hard time holding in her laughter, finally let it out when they were out of the room, and Ben was glaring at her like she was the bane of his existence.

“Had your fun?” He asked her sarcastically.

“No, it’s just…he is _so_ out of it,” Rey guffawed, “and you’re in _jeans,_ and you can speak Spanish…”

“I can’t speak it, I understand it,” he corrected her, which finally calmed her giggles a little. She had learned more about Ben Solo in the course of two days than she had for the last fifteen years that she’d been in his life, and Rey concluded that it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Unexpected, but not the worst.

“You get more interesting the more I accidentally spend time with you, Ben Solo,” Rey said, giving one last giggle before she moved to go downstairs.

“Wait,” Ben said, and she turned, blinking at him. For some reason, he was now holding a baseball cap. And Rey watched with half amusement, half horror as Ben attempted to cover up his luscious locks of hair with a New York Yankees cap, and _hello ears, I haven’t seen you in a few years._

Ben immediately noticed Rey’s amusement, because he quickly took off the hat and stuffed it in his back pocket.

“Are you busy today?” He asked her.

“Aren’t you?” Rey asked, crossing her arms over her chest, her eyebrow rising in challenge. “Last I heard, you were trying to ink a billion dollar deal with Sevin Technologies.”

“Who told you that,” he chuckled, running a hand through his hair as if to bring it back to life.

“I can’t reveal my sources, sir,” Rey said, and Ben suddenly looked very uncomfortable, clearing his throat and making her laugh even more. “Ben, what is going on?”

“I have to go up to Martha’s Vineyard,” he finally said. “We have a cottage there—“

Rey wanted to scoff, because where _didn’t_ they have a cottage.

“That my parents have been wanting to sell. Luke was supposed to live there for the rest of his life, but one can only pretend to be a hermit for so long,” Ben rolled his eyes, and Rey thought it was hilarious. She liked seeing these little family interactions, she like being around for them, even if she wasn’t there for the beginning of it.

“Ben, you’re getting sidetracked,” she pointed out.

“Yes. Well. Han was saying you were interested in photography, and I need photos of the place,” he cleared his throat. “Are you interested?”

“Are you paying me one million dollars?” Rey asked.

“Five hundred.”

“Five hundred thousand,” she countered.

“Two hundred fifty and a lobster roll.”

“Throw in a Coke?”

“Deal,” he shrugged, walking down the stairs. “I’ll meet you in the garage in fifteen minutes.”

If Rey was a wiser woman, she would have told Ben that street photography and real estate photography were completely different things. That Ben got a really shitty deal with Rey, because three hours worth of work was not worth two hundred fifty. She would have pointed out how ridiculous it was that he was pulling off this seemingly important errand in the middle of the biggest deal of his life, and that this was clearly just a ruse to get Rey away from Poe. She could have said all of that, but she didn’t.

Maybe she just really wanted that lobster roll.

Fifteen minutes later, Ben and Rey met up in front of his sleek black and orange TIE. The Solo boys were serious about their cars, and nobody else was allowed to touch or even drive Ben’s baby.

“Ready?” He asked, as Rey put her camera bag in the trunk. He was wearing sunglasses, and Rey could have sworn something inside of her was melting, but really, it was probably because it was the middle of the fucking summer, and it was just a hot day. A really hot day.

“Can I drive?” She asked, squinting in the sunlight that was streaming behind him. God he was tall.

“No.”

“It’s a thirty minute drive to Republic! What could possibly happen?”

“I don’t think you need reminding of the GoKart Incident of 2011. I still have the scar.”

“You were the one who confused GoKarts with bumper cars! And need I remind you, you were already 24, I was a minor. I plead innocent,” Rey shrugged, but didn’t argue as she slid into the passenger seat. God, was Ben just 24 then? Rey had thought he was so…old back then. But he wasn’t much older than Rey was now, just starting at Solo Corp.

“Seatbelt,” Ben reminded her as he closed the driver’s side door.

“Yes… _sir_ ,” Rey rolled her eyes as she snapped on her seatbelt, not noticing that Ben’s had stilled over the steering wheel for one second. He cleared his throat instead, and revved up the engine. The TIE purred at the hands of her owner, and they were soon cruising down the Long Island sound.

Now Rey always had an interest in cars. One would think that after living in a car for as long as she had, she would hate them, but between it taking both Han, Chewie, Rey and sometimes Ben and Poe to maintain Han’s Millennium Falcon, hearing Ben and Poe rev up their TIE and X Wing, above her bedroom, it was hard not to fall for the cars.

And Rey had to admit. The TIE was her favorite. It was one thing to see her driving away, it was quite another to be inside it, feeling the hum underneath her seat, see the way it responded so easily to any minute change Ben did. The man drove like he did everything else—with a keen efficiency so the drive was the fucking smoothest Rey had ever experienced.

It was almost criminal how sexy this was, and she really, really needed to snap out of it.

“You know, I would have done this job for just the lobster roll,” she told him, trying to diffuse the heat that was creeping quickly up her body.

And Ben Solo, the Bastard, grinned.

“I would have done it for a million.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am having a crisis on if we should have sexytimes by the lake in the next chapter. I'm going to say....yes. Hehe.


	6. Chapter 6

It was no Paris, but Martha’s Vineyard had a certain, um, white collar charm.

“This is…a cottage?” Rey asked hesitantly, as they pulled up to the most fantastic house on the marina. Luke had never mentioned this place, that looked unlike anything else among the row of neat little houses they had seen on the drive.

“It’s a shack,” Ben corrected her, glaring at the most beautiful thing Rey had possibly ever seen. She was beaming, he was frowning. It was a common theme between them, apparently. He hooked her camera bag over his shoulder and frowned at the house. “And an architectural nightmare.”

“I think it’s nice,” Rey countered, following him, almost afraid to approach.

The house looked like it was made especially for someone like Luke, quirky, reclusive, and was made to almost disappear in the landscape. The entire house looked like it was floating at the edge of the dock, built on steel beams that rose above the water. The rest of the house was made with the same green steel that reminded her of the Grand Palais, thin and beautiful as it surrounded the house. There was a higher net of glass and steel on the ceiling, creating a little courtyard that housed a single tree. The glass ensured that you had a view of the trees or the water at all times, and made you feel like you were the only person in the world.

Rey thought it was breathtaking. She snapped a photo.

“Make sure you get the…view,” Ben said, and Rey laughed, because he had to be kidding, right?

They were inside the cottage now, which Rey could tell had been decorated within an inch of its life into some cool, mid century modern style.

“I can’t believe nobody lives here,” Rey said, shaking her head as she took a photo of the bedroom, raising her camera over her head to get the a view of the bed against the scenery. Ben huffed beside her and held the camera up for her, his front against her back. Rey cleared her throat and looked up at him, as he looked down at her.

“Are you asking why I don’t live here?”

“No,” Rey shrugged. “I know you couldn’t be away from home for very long.”

“I lived here with Luke when I was younger,” he said with a frown, standing at the start of the dock and glaring at the house like he was willing it to spontaneously combust. “I went to high school here, and came back just before you came to the house, actually.“

“Oh,” Rey said, and she was surprised that she actually didn’t know that. “How was it?”

“I was getting in with a really bad crowd my freshman year of high school, Han and Leia thought shipping me off to the middle of bumfuck nowhere would fix it,” he scoffed, and Rey, who had never heard a bad word even spoken about Han or Leia in her life, stiffened. “Of course golden boy Poe never had to come, and Luke wasn’t happy to have an adolescent taking up space. I was essentially exiled until I could become the perfect son.”

“Do really believe that?” Rey asked him in concern.

“That I’m the perfect son?”

“Ben,” she said gently.

“Or maybe the school systems were really much better here than the private school in New York.”

“Do you hate them?” She asked him, the question coming out of her mouth before she could think about it. “For sending you here?”

“The thing about glass houses,” he murmured, lowering his hands and looking at Rey’s camera. “No walls. Too much space. Gave me a lot of time to think. I understood why. But I just wanted them to have loved me enough to ask if this was what I wanted. Moving here, taking over the company, everything. It feels lonely.”

The admission was quiet, and she spotted the tips of his ears turning red. He was embarrassed. But Rey sighed and touched his arm.

“You don’t know what lonely means until you’ve lived in a car by yourself for several years,” she shivered. But she had the weirdest feeling that he _did_ know. The way he was looking at her with that intense gaze made her…feel things she couldn’t quite understand. “You’re not alone, Ben.”

And there was a moment, a moment where one person in the entire universe completely understood Rey. And he was the last person she thought she would ever hear such understanding from. It was strange how she, who still felt so alone sometimes, found solace in Ben Solo.

“Neither are you,” he said gently, and the words were like a balm to the old wounds she kept digging up. She blamed the glass house, blamed his proximity to her, and that really comfoting, woody scent of him.

“Well?” He asked, raising the camera again, clearly done talking about this. “You have to work for that lobster roll.”

“Um. A little lower,” she gestured, and Ben lowered the camera just enough for her to reach up and snap. She took the camera from his hand and looked at the photo they just took together. “Ooh. Maybe I should bring you along instead of a tripod.”

“You couldn’t afford me,” he chuckled, and Rey nearly dropped her camera, because hold the phone, Ben Solo just made another joke! Was this going to keep happening, because Rey would really like to be informed.

His phone began to ring in his hand, and he excused himself and took the call, standing by the balcony, and looking everywhere but the view, which was really difficult, considering the house had nothing _but_ view.

Rey watched him, completely unconscious of the smile playing on her lips as she watched him, snapping a quick photo.

“Enjoying the view?” She teased, as he ended the call, his brow furrowed the way it always did when work was brought out around him, which meant his brow was furrowed almost constantly.

What a difference a sweater made.

“Who has the time,” he was still looking at his phone, very angrily typing something as best as a man with gigantic thumbs could.

“Don’t you?” She asked, turning from him and taking a photo of the kitchen, making sure the courtyard tree was in view.

“I’m saving up,” he pointed out, following her to the living room, still typing as he flopped into the couch.

“No you’re not,” Rey pointed out, snapping another photo of him. He looked like he belonged in this house, she had to admit.

He looked up very suddenly, like he just remembered that she was here. She could see the cogs turning in his head, thinking of the right answer, the good answer. She wished he wouldn’t think so much.

“No, I’m not. But perfect son, remember?” He asked, raising a perfectly sardonic eyebrow her way, giving her a perfect view of the tree as she sat with her back to the beach.

“You’re not a perfect son,” she said chided him, smiling. “You’re a good one. You like being the one your family relies on, the one they turn to when the youngest launches headfirst into sure disaster.”

“You think I’m…good?” He asked. “I think you’re still a little jetlagged from Paris.”

“If I didn’t trust you, or think you were good, I wouldn’t have agreed to come here with you,” she smiled, raising her camera again to take his photo.

“I think I paid you to take photos of the house,” he said, raising a hand over his face.

“You’re in the house, aren’t you?” Rey asked, giggling as she snapped a series of photos of Ben Solo glaring at her, raising a hand over his face, lowering said hand and standing from the couch, only to walk over to her and take the camera from her.

“Hey! Precious equipment!” Rey exclaimed, raising her hands to grab her camera back, but Ben was too tall, which meant that he could look like it didn’t bother him at all that a 5”7 shrimp like Rey couldn’t grab it. “You really have to stop using your height to your advantage.”

“I don’t like having my picture taken,” he told her a little sternly, still keeping his hand up as Rey lowered hers. He sounded a little insecure and vulnerable, and if he wasn’t Ben Solo, and she wasn’t Rey Niima, she would have hugged him so hard.

“Is it the ears? Relax. Your hair covers it up well,” she said, grinning up at him. “Better than it did when you were eighteen, at least.”

She remembered Ben at 18. He was angry, a little terrifying, a simmering stormcloud of rage that darkened every door he walked through. She didn’t know when or how he’d turned from that angry kid to this uber-composed, standoffish type, she had been too busy watching his brother turn from a boy to a full-on heartbreaker, but she was sorry to have missed it.

“You are such a brat,” he said with zero anger or annoyance, still not lowering his arms. Hmm. From this angle he almost looked…handsome. In a rogue- ish way, with an intensity that was almost sexy, in his own way. And she had seen enough photographs to know that he made wonderful photographs. Intense, yes, but he just had a way of looking at a camera, looking at a person and making them feel like someone was in charge. Like _he_ was in charge.

“I don’t like having my picture taken because I look unhappy,” he told her finally, and her heart tugged inside her chest. She was sure of it now, she liked him like this, when he felt comfortable enough to tell her truths that nobody else seemed to know about.

“And are you?” She asked. “Unhappy, I mean.”

“Not right now,” he said, and it was such a line that she didn’t want to believe him, damn it. She did. “But I am lonely. Which is a sad thing to admit. Ben Solo is lonely.”

Ben lowered his arms, but Rey didn’t reach for the camera. She found herself melting i to his chest, he was just warm and comfortable, and he smelled so nice, and he made her feel safe. She smiled.

“I know it’s funny…”

“No, no it’s not,” she assured him, shaking her head. “Unexpected, maybe. I was just thinking how odd it was that you and I feel the same word. Lonely. But we feel it so differently, and still I don’t think I’ve ever felt closer to someone as I do right now.”

It wasn’t so out of bounds when he bent down and captured her lips in his. Ben’s kiss was tentative, clearly he had learned from the lessons of last night at the solarium. But Rey reciprocated the action, letting him know it was alright, she wanted this too.

He was a really good kisser. Not too hard, not too soft, just tentative, and right. He was so tall Rey kept having to tiptoe, legitimately scared that she would lose balance, until she figured out she could loop her arms around Ben’s neck for balance. He pressed her closer, kissed her harder, and she totally could have lost herself in this, but her camera slipped from her hand, only to land on the couch with a dull thud. But it was enough for Ben to pull away from her, wiping his lips with his hand.

“Shit, Rey, I’m sorry,” he shook his head. “I made you uncomfortable.”

“No, no, I,” she felt the rise up on her cheeks as she picked up the camera and felt a little bit more like herself again. Even if her lips still lingered from the kiss, even if she could see that Ben’s lips were still a little swollen and stained from her lipstick. She was breathing hard, and was experiencing a curious sensation of joy. “It’s fine.”

“Maybe I should go get the lobster rolls,” he said, looking around the house. “We could eat here.”

“We could,” Rey said, nodding, but was much too distracted taking a photo of the perfect way the afternoon light was hitting the tree. God, this lake house was going to look incredible in the sunset. “Can we stay until sunset, at least? I think it will look amazing on camera.”

“You know I’m surprised that you took to photography,” Ben noted, walking out to the balcony and leaning against the railing that overlooked the water. Rey snuck a quick photo when he wasn’t looking. “I would have thought you would be much more into mechanics, or whatever the fuck it is Luke’s into these days. Reiki healing?”

“Hey, that’s a legitimate thing for most people,” she told him, snapping a photo of the perfectly styled kitchen through the glass. “But I don’t know. Whenever I look through a camera I see the small things. A mom and her daughter sharing an ice cream at the Notre Dame, a woman quietly writing in her journal. A guy I never thought I would come to know so well pretending that I can’t see him,” she smiled at him, which made Ben frown, and her laugh. “It’s like being able to tell someone else’s story. Getting to know more people without actually getting too close to them.”

She lowered her camera to smile at him. What was it about this house that made her keep wanting to spill her guts to him? Or maybe it wasn’t the house, it was him?

She really didn’t know.

* * *

“I’ll go get the lobster rolls,” Ben said suddenly, feeling the supreme need to get the fuck right out of this Lake House. And it wasn’t even because it held all of these bad memories for him, which it did. It was Rey, and the way she was making him feel that was so strong it threatened to overwhelm him. Quite easily.

He was already in the car and driving back to town to get the food when his mother called him.

“Well?” She simply asked him. “Am I expecting grandchildren from you or from Poe?”

“That’s not…” he trailed off, only momentarily confused. “Anyway. How did the meeting with the developers go?”

“Well they want more money. But they don’t want to tell me why, which is incredibly childish. I’m offering them half a million more, but that’s it. Tell me about the Lake House. How is it?”

“Lousy,” he lied through his teeth. “It’s always been the least practical house on the West Coast.”

“Well your grandfather was never the most practical man. Dramatic, yes, practical, no. But it’s good that you’re there with her.”

“Is it?” Ben asked, frowning as he pulled up to the front of the ramshackle place that he used to go to whenever he needed a bit of comfort food. It was very rare that he did, he used to believe that pain was part of the process, but when he did, this was the food that always made him hate himself just a little bit less. “I feel like I’m trying so hard to keep myself balanced, but she keeps knocking the wind out of me. I damn near cried twice already.”

“That’s not such a bad thing, you know,” his mother chided him. “But take your time. I have things handled here at the office. Your brother’s a little out of it still. Remind me never to let glass just lie around the house ever again.”

“I will,” Ben sighed, hanging up before he turned off the engine and got up to get their food. Then he passed by the grocery store to get chips, salad ingredients, wine and the soda he’d promised to throw in with his meal. And because it was right next door, he also stopped by the pharmacy because he needed…a toothbrush.

Yep. That was it. A toothbrush.

The sun was setting just as Ben arrived back at the Lake House, and the place was shimmering. He could see that Rey was almost beside herself in excitement, trying to capture the light that was bouncing around inside in a mad frenzy of orange and yellows, and reds. He watched her for a moment, his arms laden with food, and gave in to a moment of weakness. One where he imagined that he and Rey lived here, just the two of them, away from the madness and the business of his work, away from the things that had scarred her so deeply.

They could be happy here together.

It wasn’t the first time he’d imagined leaving everything behind—his work, his family, leaving it all behind so he could so…something. He still wasn’t too sure what, but the idea got more and more tempting, especially now with Rey so near.

But he shook off the thought and headed back to the house, firmly reminding himself that it was useless to dwell in useless things like fantasies. His reality was that he went to work, did the dirty work, never set a foot wrong. Not this. Not her. Rey deserved someone that would love her the way she was, not because of what she had become after Paris.

“I have the food,” he announced, walking in just as she looked up from behind her camera, and waved.

“Thank god, I’m starving!” she exclaimed, before she ducked back behind her camera, snapping away. “Can you unpack the food in the kitchen?”

What else could he do but comply?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so no lakeside secytimes in this chapter. It's very difficult because our Ben is such an emotional boi, he can't just jump into something, no matter if he really really wants to huhu. 
> 
> But there is sexytimes in the next chapter. Promise.


	7. Chapter 7

“Oh my god,” Rey gasped, falling backward to lie on the deck of the balcony, placing her hands over her stomach. Ben had laid out a picnic blanket to use as an altar for their feast, and Rey managed to eat two rolls, three cans of soda, and most of the chips. “I swear you don’t have to pay me anymore, those lobster rolls were amazing.”

“I told you,” he said, trying not to grin, because he was a little drunk, very full and very happy.

“You did,” she said, turning her head so she was looking at him now. In a fit of pique that he never would have allowed himself before, Ben picked up Rey’s camera, pointed it to her and snapped a photo. She blinked at him in surprise when he chuckled and peered at the screen to see a preview of the photo. There were lights in the water, no doubts from boats passing the water to get to the docks, and with the lights from inside the house, created this lovely halo effect on her face.

The chuckle fell from his lips as he realized how breathtakingly beautiful she was. Oh, he knew it on some level. It was hard not to look at her the night at the party (was that only yesterday?) and not think she was. He looked at her, and she back at him.

“Ben Solo made me lobster rolls,” she said, a small smile playing on her lips, and he shook his head.

“I didn’t make anything, I bought it,” he said, leaning back against the sturdy metal frame of the house.

“Still,” Rey insisted, sitting up so she can take a sip of wine. “How long did you stay in Paris, when we met?”

“I left the next day,” he shrugged. “I finished everything I needed to do.”

“Well, I can’t imagine you’d like it very much anyway,” she sipped again.

“Hey, I could like it if I was there.”

“You?” She shook her head. “Paris is all about pleasure, Ben. Yeah, life isn’t easy, life is expensive there more than most cities, but it’s hard not to stop and watch time pass, think about the things that really make you happy.”

“You think I don’t know what makes me happy?”

“I think you think you do,” She put her glass back on the picnic blanket. “Ben Solo, the world’s only living heart donor.”

“Is that what people say about me?”

“Well, they also call you Vader’s heir.”

He wrinkled his nose, because being compared to your grandfather’s extremely harsh business tactics, the same harshness that caused the Skywalker fortune to collapse into itself. His mother’s hard work had ensure that the family could stay afloat, and rebuilt everything on Han’s money.

“What about you?” He asked her. “What do you tell people I’m like?”

She seemed to think about it, and Ben wanted to reach out and brush a little bit of wine that had lingered on her lip. He wanted to taste it, even if he had his own glass.

Fuck, he was in trouble.

"I tell people the story our rainy day together,” Rey said, and he didn’t need all that much light to see the small smile that had formed on her face, a face she so rarely made whenever she had to remember something from the past. “Do you remember?”

He had to admit, he didn’t. But then again, he barely paid attention to other things outside his work until lately.

“Chewie and your Dad weren’t in town,” Rey frowned, a little crease forming bin between her eyebrows as she tried to remember. “And your Mom convinced Luke to drive her and Poe up for a music lesson.”

“How old was he then?”

“Sixteen,” Rey sighed, and there was that dreamy little sigh of hers, one that she seemed to have saved especially for his brother. _That’s right_ , he told himself. _She’s in love with Poe. You’re a distraction._

“He would have been learning the French Horn then,” Ben noted, and Rey’s face lit up in amusement. “He never practiced, and I had a feeling Mom just wanted to get out of the house because she was lonely when Han’s not in it.”

“That’s sweet,” Rey noted, smiling, clearly failing to notice that her story centered around the fact that she and Ben had been left behind the house to themselves. “You really care about your brother, don’t you?”

“I love him like any man would love his brother,” Ben shrugged, because it was true. Poe was funny and reminded him to laugh. He was the only person in the world (aside from Han) who didn’t take Ben too seriously, and so easily saw through his veneer of bullshit. “I just don’t know what to do with him.”

“Is that really something you have to decide?”

“I don’t know what would make him happy,” he clarified. “When we were kids, he was more excited than I was to go to the office with Mom. We would play a game where we guessed who she was talking to, guess who was about to get a haranguing. When Han would go down to the development sites, Poe would wriggle his way through all the parts of the construction site better than I ever could. I don’t really know why he stopped, but…sorry. I interrupted you.”

“No, It’s fine,” Rey shook her head. “I like hearing you talk.”

“Talk about Poe?” Ben asked, because he was clearly a masochist.

“No, just…about everything,” she mused.

“But anyway. You said it was a rainy day,” he quickly put them back on track. Rey’s face immediately changed, frowning as she recalled whatever memory she was pulling from.

“It was a storm, actually,” she said, softly, and he knew right way that it hadn’t been a good day for her. She never really told anyone why, but storms and lighting terrified her, even to this day, it was common to see her inside the mansion when the storms were particularly bad. “I was alone in the quarters, then I ran into the house. I was wet, and I tried to turn on a lamp and got a shock. I thought I’d gotten struck my lightning, and I was scared and completely terrified. I was crying. But then again when wasn’t I crying at that time? I still thought Chewie had taken me away from my family.”

Ben didn’t know why he didn’t remember this. He would have been around eighteen then. A lot of things about his life were a blur around that time.

“You must have been nearby, because you just…showed up,” Rey said, her face getting that soft, fond quality again. Ben realized that he was in raptures over the way she spoke. Her voice was a little deeper than most women, but it had a quality that just made him want to keep listening. “And you wrapped me in a blanket, and we sat on the couch the whole afternoon, until Leia, Luke and Poe came back.”

And just like that, he remembered. He’d been his room, thinking if he should take up an offer for him to go away to California at the Snoke Institute for his university studies. He remembered the overwhelming feeling of needing to leave the suddenly too-full house, to escape his father’s abrasive personality, to stop getting hurt every time his mother gave Poe a winsome smile, because Poe was the favorite.

Then he’d heard Rey sobbing in the hallway. How could he have forgotten the way she looked at him, scared out of her wits, relying totally on _him_ to find the answer.

“You were a lot braver than I was,” He said, and now it was his turn to smile softly at her. “I was already wondering how I was supposed to keep a kid alive.”

“What, like foraging off of the land?” Rey laughed.

“I was already wondering if I had to hunt for dinner,” He said back, and they both shared a laugh, and it felt so nice to be away from everything, and to be with her like this.

“You know, I always wondered why you never got married,” Rey mused.

“34 is not that old,” he argued.

“No,” she clarified, giggling again as she shook her head. “I mean you would have been a good husband, I think. With your foraging skills. And you’re actually very caring, even when people can’t see it.”

If Ben still had a heart, it would have grown ten sizes by now. But still, even the world’s only living heart donor still felt warm glow in his chest.

“Well, I’m a horrible cook, so you can count that out of my skill set,” he pointed out.

“I think I can forgive a man who can’t cook if he knows where the good lobster rolls are,” she argued. “Is it that you don’t believe in marriage? I would be be surprised if you didn’t.”

“Oh, I do,” he said, and it was the truth. His parents fought every second they were together, and they could claw viciously at each other so hard that Ben still felt some of those scars. But when they were together, they were really together. They knew each other so well, and that feeling of knowing someone that well? Ben wanted that for himself. “That’s probably why I never got married.”

He didn’t want to risk giving up…whatever heart he had left to someone who didn’t care. He would never survive a divorce, emotionally.

Rey seemed to consider this, nodding.

“I’m not sure I believe in marriage,” staring miserably at her wine glass, frowning. “I don’t really have much to compare it to.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that,” Ben pointed out to her. “Poe doesn’t seem to believe in it either.”

“Earth to Ben, he’s engaged to Finn.”

“Yeah, but three engagements in seven years is a bad track record, no matter how many ways you slice it.”

“I don’t know,” Rey sighed, wrapping her arms around her knees. “I do like the idea of someone promising to be with someone else for the rest of their lives, but promises…promises break. Very easily.”

She looked up at Ben suddenly, like she’d forgotten he was there.

“Please don’t tell Poe I said that,” she said, and the little remnants of Ben’s heart sank to his stomach, mixing horribly with the wine and lobster rolls. Right. He was just supposed to be the distraction. The true love of Rey’s life was a drive and a helicopter ride away, probably just starting to wake up from his drug-induced coma. “I don’t know why I keep telling you these things, Ben.”

“Maybe it’s my magnetic personality.”

“It could be,” she said it in a way that made him feel like it wasn’t just that.

If Ben was less of a selfish person, he would wrap everything up and ask Rey if she wanted to go back to the house to see Poe. What was a billion dollar deal, anyway?

But he was selfish. Hopelessly and horribly so. He was the villain. So he knew exactly what he was doing when he stood up from his spot against the wall to kneel in front of Rey, take her face in his hands and kiss her again. While the kiss earlier in the house had been a surprise, this was like lighting a spark that spread, from the top of his head to the tips of his toes. He’d worried when it didn’t seem like Rey was going to kiss him back, but she did.

She took control of the kiss very quickly, shoving her hands through his hair and tugging lightly at the strands, making him moan. He sucked at the skin on her neck and she arched into him. Ben was already getting hard, and he needed a hand on the floor to keep himself steady, to keep himself in check.

“Stop resisting,” Rey whispered as she took a breath, before she nibbled at the skin on his neck. Holy shit.

“Fuck, Rey.”

“That’s the plan, I hope,” she giggled, and hell yes that was the fucking plan. Ben Solo, who had not had sex with anyone in at least three years, picked her up from the floor, carrying her like she was light as air to drop her on the bed.

Rey looked up at him with wide, blown out eyes, swollen lips and a red flush on her cheeks. He could already see the telltale mark of a love bite where he’d sucked at her skin near her cleavage, and seeing it catch the light made him even harder.

She sat up and pulled at the hem of his sweater, tugging it up insistently until Ben complied. Her hands were on his body right away, and he gave in to a full body shudder at the thought.

“Holy shit, I knew you were built like a Greek god under those suits,” Rey’s hands were hot as they roamed his body, pressing against his chest, her nails raking very lightly over his skin. One of her hands palmed the straining erection in his pants and he moved his hips shamelessly against it. “And you’re big. Oh my god.”

“Wait, wait,” he said, and it took all of his willpower to pull away from her hand. His head was spinning, and he didn’t know if it was the openness of the lake house, or Rey sprawled on the bed just for him, but he wanted to make her come first. He wanted to make sure she wanted this as much as he did.

“Want to get you wet first,” he told her, placing his hands on her hips, his fingers skimming the skin between the ruched up hem of her tank top and her shorts. “May I get you wet, Rey?”

“Please,” she said, practically shimmying out of her shorts for him, and the sight of her bare and open and waiting for _him,_ Jesus Christ it was dangerous. He had wanted her for as long as he could remember, that he couldn’t quite believe that this wasn’t another dream. That she was here, waiting for him, of all people.

He spread her legs open, his fingers flitting over the insides of her thigh.

“Stop squirming,” he told her with a tiny smile as he pulled her down the edge of the bed, and he kneeled on the floor.

“I can’t make any promises to—oh holy shit. Ben!” Rey actually yelped as Ben licked a stripe between her legs, nuzzling closer so he could find her clit, and suck on it.

“Yes?” He asked innocently looking up at her. She looked down at him, and he liked looking up at her from between her legs. He loved that he made her have this reaction. He slid a finger inside her, pleased to find her wet and wanting. He hooked the finger that was inside, and the sound she made was so deliciously erotic, he filed it away for future use. He made a promise to himself to illicit more of those sounds from her tonight.

“You dirty bastard,” she said, shaking her head with a disbelieving little laugh, digging her nails into his shoulder as Ben slid another finger inside to join the first, sucking at her clit. Her hips rose, and he used his free hand to place over her stomach to steady her. “Fuck, Ben!”

“Not yet,” he teased, and resumed his task. Sure it had been a while since he got to pleasure a woman like this, but it was like riding a bike. Once he figured out how Rey liked it, how deep she could take him, he allowed himself to savor the feeling, to enjoy it for what it was… just a fleeting moment.

“Come for me, Rey,” he told her, sliding third finger to join the two. Rey’s leg was thrown over his shoulder, and her heels were digging into his back for but he wasn’t letting up. His cock throbbed painfully, seeking pleasure as hers rose, higher and higher. Ben could hear nothing from the glass house, nothing except the infinite night, the squish and suck of his mouth and his fingers, and Rey, Rey’s erotic cries, her saying and cursing his name.

She came with a shout, so loud that he thought the glass panes of the bedroom shook. She fell backward on the bed, panting, with her nipples pebbling through her shirt. Ben allowed himself the luxury of giving one a little nibble through the fabric of her shirt, and Rey took the hand that was inside her to give his fingers a little lick.

“Ben,” she told him. “I want you inside me.”

The magic words.

“Shit,” he said, quickly grabbing the conveniently purchased condom, practically stumbling as he took off his pants, and Rey tossed her shirt aside. He stroked himself a couple of times, knowing he was only torturing himself the longer he let this go on.

“You bought condoms,” she noted, and there was a moment he thought she would get angry because it made it look like he had planned this all along. When really, Ben wasn’t that smart when it came to things like this. “Such a boy scout.”

“I wasn’t presuming—“ he said, cut off when Rey kneeled up on the bed, took the condom from between his fingers. Her own delicate little hand wrapped around him, pumping him in a way that got him so close to coming he had to ask her to stop. She laughed and slid the condom over him, leaving a reassuring little kiss on his lips.

“You still taste like me,” She licked her own lips after. “I love it.”

 _And I love you,_ he caught himself just in time because holy shit. He didn’t. He couldn’t. Not yet. Not ever.

He pushed aside the feeling threatening to break inside him, pushing it aside, because that wasn’t what she wanted, not what she needed from him. She just wanted him for sex, and that was fine with him.

So he complied, scooting her up on the bed with one arm, and Rey gasped and giggled, holding on to him. She relaxed against the sheets as he nibbled at his bottom lip, nervous.

“Ben?” She asked. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” he said, and he hated that his throat was suddenly dry. Then, because he needed to regain some semblance of control, he held his cock in his hands and positioned himself inside her.

Fuck if it wasn’t the greatest high he’d ever experienced. Rey bucked her hips up, and held on to him, and Ben set the pace for them both. Her nails were definitely digging in to his skin now, and her leg was hitched around his waist.

“You feel so good. Oh Ben,” Rey said, as he pressed his forehead against hers, and it felt so gratifying to have her underneath him, having her want him and need him this much. “Why have we never done this before?”

She braced her feet on the bed, which let him push inside her at just the right spot, and he saw stars. His orgasm hit him much faster than he had hoped, and he was coming inside her, hard and fast, and she followed right after him, tugging at his hair for good measure. Ben felt his entire body unwind and start to relax as he pulled out of her.

It was done. It was over, and just when Ben thought that finally being able to have sex with Rey would satisfy him, he only found himself asking when they could do this again, when he could have her in her arms again, when she could call his name like she needed him.

He looked at Rey, half-expecting her to turn around and leave, but instead, she loosened her grip on his hair and smiled softly at him, chasing one last, lazy kiss on his lips. She smiled at him, and he felt…happy. Safe and loved, in a way that secretly terrified him.

He lay on his back, almost scooping Rey up so he could hold her a little closer.

“Where have you been all my life, Ben Solo?” He thought he heard her ask, spoken into his skin before she pressed her cheek over his rapidly beating heart.

“Right here,” he said in response, closing his eyes. “I’ve been right here.”

* * *

One of the things Rey was realizing as the downside of living in a glass house was the sun. Once it hit the glass, it hit _everything_ in the house, and immediately woke her up. For someone who used to live in a car, who didn’t love the sunlight all that much to begin with, it immediately woke her up.

“Mph,” she mumbled, turning her head so she could bury it in her pillow, surprised to find that her cheek found contact with a warm, chest, and that the weight around her body wasn’t a blanket at all, but the solid figure of none other than Ben Solo.

He looked much younger when he was asleep, almost vulnerable where he was inscrutable when he was awake. Rey felt almost privileged to be able to see him like this, to be in his arms like this.

She felt safe here.

Ben shifted, sleepily exhaling as he shimmied a little lower, so his head was now resting on her chest, and Rey felt something very hard and very much awake prodding near her thigh. She giggled softly and raked her fingers lightly through his hair. Ben’s head immediately turned toward her hand, savoring her touch.

“Are you awake?” she asked him.

“No,” he replied, but there was no way she could believe him when he smiled, even the tiniest bit, deep smile lines showing up when he did. Rey thought it was a crying shame that not more people were privy to Ben Solo’s smile, but thought having the sublime pleasure of being the reason for it was nice too.

He placed a sleepy kiss on her collarbone, and she giggled. Then, her mind finding an idea and seizing on it, she threw the covers over her head to get out of the sunlight and wriggled free from his embrace, pushing his shoulder so he could lie on his back while she retraced the little purple marks she left on his smooth chest, lightly scratching the shape of Ben’s nipples.

“Oh,” he groaned from above her, and adjusted his hips to give Rey all the access she needed. “Are you sure you want to…?”

She pulled the covers off over her head and placed a hand over his mouth.

“Not another word from you,” Rey said, then slowly and deliberately added, “Sir.”

“Fuck,” Ben said, his lips pressing together in a thin line as Rey shimmied lower down his body, stopping just as she met the resistance of his cock. She made a little ‘mmm’ sound as she touched it, spreading the liquid that was already coming out of the tip.

“Is this what you want?” She asked him, giving it an experimental little lick. His muscles tensed, and she could feel it. “Ben?”

“…Rey,” he said, his voice a little strangled as she pumped him lightly, shaking his head. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”

“Wow Ben, you kiss your mother with that mouth?” Rey teased, pushing aside his hand when he attempted to reach down and try to fondle her breast.

“Don’t talk about…I only kiss _you,_ Rey. Oh fuuuuck,” he said, and Rey pressed a little harder, pumped a little faster. And knowing that he was watching her, she looked up at him, at the way those dark eyes of his focused on her and not her lips as he sucked him.

She loved the way he said ‘fuck.’

It didn’t take much long for Ben to stop holding back, and to give in to his orgasm. Cum shot out of his cock, and Rey moved her mouth away, still pumping him until his entire body finally unraveled, and he fully collapsed backward on the bed, and a real mess was made.

“We’re going to have to wash these sheets,” Rey told him, and he threw an arm over his eyes.

“Mmmm,” was all he managed to say in return. Rey laughed and moved up, getting her hand all sticky as she pressed her hand to Ben’s stomach before she kissed him.

“I’ll shower and get breakfast,” she told him. “You clean up. Do you happen to have a toothbrush?”

* * *

Rey and Ben were giddy as they took their time getting back to the manor. Throughout that, Rey found herself teasing him, loving the way he looked at her like she was being a brat, unable to hide the little smile he seemed to have reserved just for her.

It was already evening by the time they got back to the manor, with Rey behind the wheel of the TIE Silencer.

“Ta-da!” She exclaimed hitting the break as they pulled up to the driveway of Solo manor. “I told you, I was an excellent driver.”

“Are we dead?” Ben asked, lowering his hand from his face, as Rey playfully elbowed him in the ribs.

“Relax,” She rolled her eyes. “We’re in one piece. You don’t grow up around Chewie and Han and not know how to drive a car well.”

“Yes, but learning on a piece of junk like the Falcon is exactly like driving a top of the line TIE,” Ben challenged, finally taking off his seatbelt, making sure to grab the lobster rolls they brought back for everyone. Rey had insisted, and Ben was too nice to say no.

Can you imagine? Ben Solo? Nice?

“I don’t know Ben, if you look at the way Poe drives, it’s probably worse,” Rey unhooked her seatbelt and got out of the car as well. “If he had his way, he would accelerate through the entire drive without stopping once.”

“I’ll tell him you said that,” he said, and suddenly they were looking at each other from across Ben’s car, in the garage of the mansion. It was like the time and the lake house hadn’t really happened, lost in a haze of dreamlike glass and sunlight.

“I enjoyed spending time with you,” Ben said, putting his hand in his pocket, smiling a little at her. “Even if you were the most expensive photographer I’ve ever hired.”

“Hey, I’m worth it, aren’t I?” Rey closed the car door and rest her elbows on it to gaze adoringly at his face. She was wearing yesterday’s clothes still, but she felt clean and happy and not at all ashamed. “I liked spending time with you too.”

“Show me those pictures at the office tomorrow,” Ben said. “I’ll have you meet with the real estate agent so we can put that Lake House up on the market.”

“Okay,” Rey said, because after listening to Ben’s story, she understood his need to sell the Lake House very suddenly, even if it pained her to think it.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Ben nodded, about to turn and leave, when Rey remembered something and called Ben.

“I heard Luke once ask Poe why he stopped coming to the office,” she said, trying to choose her words carefully, knowing this was a touchy subject for him. “Poe never gave him a totally serious answer.”

“Of course,” Ben sighed.

“But he did say that he didn’t go because he knew you would be there,” Rey pointed out.

“Is that a bad thing?” He asked her, frowning slightly.

“No,” She admitted. “You’re really good at your job. But it does make me wonder.”

“Hm?”

“Where do you live?” She asked, tilting her head to the side in curiosity.

“Here,” he told her, indicating the house, slightly confused. “I live here.”

“No, Ben,” Rey rolled her eyes, because it was surprising to her that someone who was so smart could be so obtuse. “Where does your heart live? What makes you happy, if you didn’t have the work?”

From the look of surprise on his face, she knew that he didn’t have an answer to that. And she understood it, as someone who had wandered from place to place, not to know where you belonged.

Rey knew.

So instead of confusing him any further, she simply smiled and walked over to him, giving him a kiss on the cheek. Oddly enough, after everything they shared, this seemed like the most intimate thing she had done with him.

“See you tomorrow,” she said gently, smiling.

Then she turned and walked to the servants quarters, leaving Ben with a look of surprise on his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the first time I've ever had to write a blowjob scene so I kind of gloss over a lot of the details, but I love the idea of Rey enjoying her time with Ben after we got his point of view from the night before. 
> 
> Anyway, the chapters have officially caught up with my writing (I'm usually one chapter ahead of the posting) but I will do my best to get the next bit up by next week! I think we're about halfway through the movie plot already. Hope you guys have a good week! <3
> 
> Also I had to Google Adam Driver smiling for this I am not mad. And I love the way he says fuck, it's so...succinct HAHA.


	8. Chapter 8

The following morning, bright and early Ben found himself walking around the Solo property, a restless energy following him as he did. He hadn’t been able to sleep last night either, even after a finger of whiskey or two.

He was consumed by thoughts from the night before. Of Rey, smiling and laughing, her eyes crinkling as she did. She almost seemed to curl up into herself when she laughed, like it was a precious secret she needed to hide from the rest of the world, and Ben was one of the lucky ones to have been granted permission to see it.

His feelings were starting to get complicated. He had somewhat known that enacting a plan like this, going down this path would mean complicating emotions that he’d been carrying with him for quite some time now, since Paris, since five years ago before that. But he hadn’t expected those emotions to hit this hard. Hell, he didn’t expect these emotions to hit _him_ this hard.

“Hey stranger,” a voice, deep and gruff said, and he looked up, unsurprised to find Luke sitting on a bench by the rose garden, holding one of his many books and glaring at Ben like was the suspicious one. He and his uncle never got along, not even on the best days, and Ben realized the best approach with him was to just keep his guards up so high that nothing Luke ever said would penetrate him.

But the thing with high walls was that they were easier to break down if you found a weak spot. And Luke had been really good at that.

“Luke,” He said, giving him a polite nod.

“Free day?” Luke asked, almost mocking as he lowered the copy of another one of his many pretentious books. Ben didn’t even have to see the title to know it was probably written by some dead poet or intellectual.

“I’m selling your lake house,” Ben said, almost just to spite him. Even if now as he was saying it, he couldn’t bear to do it. Not because of Luke, but because the house now held something special to him, held the memory of a moment that he would carry with him for the rest of his life, deep in the recesses of his cold, dead heart.

Poe was off the pain meds today. Soon enough, he would be up and about, and Ben would have to take more drastic measures to separate him from Rey. And he didn’t like it. He wished he could just tell her point blank about the situation and send her off on her merry way, but the risk of her laughing in his face and staying anyway was too high. Then of course there was the caveat that Poe wasn’t actually in love with Rey, and that she’d just been a fleeing distraction, as Poe was usually susceptible to fleeting distractions, but that was impossible. How could anyone not fall in love with Rey?

“That’s your prerogative,” Luke shrugged nonchalantly. “I heard you and Rey went to Martha’s Vineyard yesterday.”

“Yes. I fed her lobster rolls.”

“Of course you did,” he shook his head like he was disappointed in Ben, which was pretty much Luke’s default setting. “Be careful with her, Ben. Her emotions are not worth whatever billion dollar scheme you have up your sleeve.”

“Yes they are,” he said, not because he actually believed it, but because he just wanted to one up Luke, and the sad thing was that Luke knew it, that deep down, deep down inside Ben Solo’s heart was a decent man. And wasn’t that just the worst. “Why did you make her come back from Paris? She was so happy there.”

“I didn’t,” Luke admitted. “I always thought that she felt like she didn’t belong here. Not above a garage, not above a mansion. But she wanted to come home, she said. She could live in Paris, but Solo mansion is home. She missed Poe, I suppose.”

“Right. Poe. I have to go to work,” Ben said, frowning before he turned his heel in the direction of the house. “I should be working on this merger, not…”

_Not thinking so much about this girl. This girl and her incredible spirit, her eye to see the good in everything and those god damn hazel eyes._

“Good luck,” Luke’s voice practically haunted him as he hightailed it back to the house.

* * *

Coming back into the city was almost a welcome relief to Ben. He noticed Chewie eyeing him through the window of the car as they pulled up in front of Solo Towers in Midtown, and pretended not to notice.

“What time should I pick you up?” Chewie asked him as they pulled up in front of Solo Tower. Ben looked up at the building for a moment before he turned back to Chewie.

“I had the TIE brought to the garage,” he said. “I’ll make my way home.”

“Sure,” Chewie said, and Ben wondered if he had just imagined the dismissiveness in his tone.

But once he ascended up the forty eight floors to his office, a sense of relaxation and calm returned to him. He felt certain parts of him slot back into their old places, and even if it felt slightly off, it was still him.

“You’re here, at the office,” Hux said, falling into step with him like nothing was amiss as Ben was handed file after file, some for signature, some for his notation and some for him to put a huge, red ‘X’ over. “I have to say, the office was different without you.”

“I’ve been gone for a day,” he pointed out, realizing that Hux in love was just as insufferable as Hux on the regular, except he was a lot more chuffed with himself and had a hint of self confidence that he didn’t necessarily warrant. Ah the power of love.

“Still, your absence was felt,” he said, following Ben right into his corner office, which had a lovely view of the city that he paid millions for but never really looked at. Could he always see Rockefeller Plaza from his office? “How goes your plans to interfere with your brother’s love life for a billion dollars?”

“As well as can be expected,” Ben said, sitting behind his desk and attacking the pile of papers that had accumulated there. “I’m still not telling you anything. You’re literally sleeping with Rey’s best friend.”

“You make what Rose Tico and I have seem so crass,” Hux rolled his eyes. “But I appreciate the gesture. What do you have going on tonight? Rose is going back to Long Island for a few days before she fully moves in to my place.”

“Already? How long was I gone?”

“Relax, Solo. Driving from Long Island to Manhattan every day is ridiculous. You should know, you do it every time, and her work on Wall Street can leave her exhausted on the best days. I offered my spare room for convenience.”

“Convenience,” Ben echoed, shaking his head.

“I’m going to pretend I did not hear that. What do you say to one last night of debauchery within normal human limits before then?”

“Can’t,” Ben said, not looking up from his work. “Rey’s coming over at six. I was thinking of asking her to dinner.”

“Ah, so the plan is going well,” Hux said, and if he was mildly surprised, Ben didn’t know. “Really well from the way you’re…good god man. You’re blushing.”

“I am not,” Ben tried to keep a stoic face, but when he did, he thought of Rey’s mouth sucking his cock, and it immediately made his face heat. Pathetic.

“You are,” Hux gasped, almost astonished. “You really like her.”

“My feelings have nothing to do with the merger with Sevin Tech,” Ben insisted, trying his hardest to shake the memory from his mind. But it was pretty much impossible at this point, because now he was entertaining fantasies of having sex with Rey in this office, with that view spread out below them.

Jesus. Fucking. Christ.

“And I need dinner reservations for tonight. Somewhere exclusive. Somewhere a pretentious jackass like you would take a lady.”

“Pretentious jackasses like me actually know how to make a lady feel special,” Hux pointed out. “Do you?”

“I really don’t need your input. And if I remember correctly, you’re supposed to be busy with the due diligence on Sevin.”

“Oh please, the due diligence is just compliance at this point,” Hux rolled his eyes. You have Rey on your mind. It’s adorable. I’ll book you a table at the cheesiest, most romantic restaurant in New York. The kind where you pay through the nose but still end up sharing a straw for a milkshake.”

“Do that,” Ben said in response, letting Hux leave the office. There was just a moment where the door was partially open as he stepped outside, and Ben heard the distinct sounds of Hux’s laughter from the door.

“Asshole,” he muttered, going back to his work. So what if most of the time he found himself distracted by the thought of her pretty eyes and her laugher? So what if there was actually one meeting where he had no idea that the other person was saying, just because he was wondering what Rey would be wearing tonight?

 _At your building. Should I head up?_ Her text message arrived promptly at six, right in the middle of Ben still caught in the floodgates of work.

 _They should be expecting you,_ Ben replied, and he had never worked as fast as he did, breezing through checks that needed his signature, Memos and notices that he didn’t really read. It was like her arrival had set his skin on fire, and he needed her to soothe it.

“Miss Rey Niima, here for you, sir,” Mitaka said over the phone just as Ben finished up.

“Send her in,” he said, trying to sound casual. A quick open of the door later, there she was.

“You’re wearing a dress,” he said with the tiniest smile, because Rey looked lovely. She was wearing a yellow dress that had flowers printed on it, a breath of fresh, springtime air in his somewhat severe office. She looked around the place, her eyes wide with her mouth a little open in surprise.

“Holy shit, Ben, your office is bigger than my apartment in Paris. Is that a real Rothko painting on your wall?” She asked, already looking around the rest of the space just as Ben was about to tell her that yes, that was an original Rothko that his mother had purchased, although why two big blocks of color on another block of color was of any significance was well beyond his understanding. “Is that the Chrysler building?”

“I think so,” Ben said, never taking his eyes off of her. He rose slowly from his desk, trying to get his breath in check, trying not to look or sound like such a besotted fool, because he definitely was not. He moved to the little seating area on the side of the office, supposedly used for more casual meetings or lunch breaks, but was never really anything to Ben beyond another bed he slept in when he needed to stay longer at the office. “How did the pictures turn out?”

“Amazing,” Rey sighed almost regretfully, sitting down next to the coffee table like she did this kind of thing all the time. She pulled her laptop out of a bag, and Ben didn’t miss that the device had stickers of cameras, museums and pressed flowers on it. He was just drinking in every part of her that she was willing to share. “You know I almost wanted to fuck up these photos so you wouldn’t have to sell the house.”

“Why didn’t you?” he asked, amused.

“I’m a professional, Ben Solo. Give me some credit, please,” she rolled her eyes, but smiled anyway before she turned the laptop in his direction. “Have a look.”

Ben wasn’t quite sure what he was looking at. She had opened to tome sort of…app, and there were several folders (albums?) on it. He clicked on one of the photos and a photograph of the Notre Dame from the view of a little rose garden came into view.

The colors were slightly saturated to make the sky seem to sparkle with blue, like the surface of the ocean. The stone facade of the Cathedral seemed warmer, but still imposing, and the photograph made it look like a castle in the sky, with a cloud of deep green to carry it, a single red rose bright and visible in the foreground. Ben had been to Paris quite a few times now, had seen the Notre Dame, but it never looked quite like this.

He clicked on the next photo. A closer shot of the roses, deep red and lovely. He could almost feel how velvety they were just from the photograph. The next photo nearly took his breath away. It was a dark shot, of a small attic room in a seemingly random apartment, the window thrown open to let a small amount of yellow light pour in. The light landed on a spot in the bed, where Rey was sitting over her sheets, her head looking at the light, a small smile on her lips. She was hugging her knees as she did so, but still, she looked vulnerable even with all her happiness, like she was trying to keep it close, and keep it to herself. Her shoulders were bare, and so were her legs. Even though Ben couldn’t really see anything, it was a very intimate photo.

Ben cleared his throat.

“What’s wrong?” Rey’s brows furrowed.

“I don’t remember taking this,” he said, turning the laptop to face her. And even though he had definitely seen her breasts before, had definitely seen her naked, the both of them still acted ridiculously embarrassed about it all, and Rey was fiercely blushing before Ben pointedly looked away.

“Oh shit, sorry, I didn’t just open the right folder, did I,” she shook her head.

“It’s fine,” Ben said, smiling. “You looked happy in that photo.”

“I was,” Rey said, showing him the right album now, the familiar sight of the glass house and the lake filling up the screen. Ben knew he wasn’t selling the house anyway, but he liked these photos. Rey made it look like the most peaceful place in the world, where one could truly be alone. He didn’t know how, but that was what it felt like, looking at the photos now.

“I just found out that I got an internship with Vogue Paris with Rose,” Rey continued. “And the sun just came out, and…it was one of those moments when I couldn’t believe I was there. So I had to capture it, to sort of remember.”

“Getting old, Rey?” He teased, because he was an idiot like that.

“You’re one to talk,” she giggled back at him.

“You know I never thought you of all people would be such a Francophile,” he said, browsing the photos again, memories of the other night flooding back to him. “You always seemed to be climbing up trees or covered in dirt, in my memories.”

“That…is fair,” Rey chuckled.

“A combination of mud or grease, always one or the other.”

“I always hear people say, _I went to Paris to find myself,_ ” Rey said, hugging her knees again, looking like some approximation of her own photo. “And I thought, _how ridiculous, how could you be lost?_ My entire life has been about not losing myself, doing everything I could not to starve, not to get hurt, to keep myself intact. But you never really have the opportunity to think about yourself mentally, until you have the privilege to. And I was one of the lucky ones to get that chance. I would have been happy going to community college, or find work after high school, but…for the first time in my life, I let myself dream of Paris.”

“And when I got there it was…it was like it had been waiting for me. I realized that I actually really enjoyed walking around, I enjoyed taking photos of cats and sipping coffee and watching the world go by. Suddenly I had time, and all this beauty in front of me. My life had never felt more full. And then I realize that your family gave me Paris, but Paris gave me, myself. I could do something that wasn’t just about surviving. And I may be a jobless graduate right now, but I won’t always be. And I’ll always have the means to help someone. That’s all I want to do, really. Take pictures, and help other people.

Then she looked up at him. Ben wasn’t quite sure what expression he had on his face, only that he was listening intently to her, and Rey chuckled, looking away. “You’re making fun of me.”

“You called me the world’s only living heart donor. I get to make fun of you a little,” he said, hoping that she knew that he was just joking. He could make jokes. He just chose not to do it most of the time.

They shared a little knowing smile, like they had a secret between them, and for the first time, he felt his heart give a little flip in his chest. Oh god. It was alive, and it completely belonged to her. He was so fucked.

“Move over,” Rey finally said, getting up from the floor. “I want to show you my favorite photo.”

He obliged, and she sat so close to him that her thigh pressed against his. Even if there was so much room on both sides of the couch. Ben could smell something slightly floral on her skin, or on her hair, he didn’t know. He wanted to breathe her in, pull her close and never let go.

Suddenly, he found himself looking at her impossibly hazel eyes. She was smiling in amusement, her eyes dancing as she looked at him like she’d caught him doing something he shouldn’t have.

“Pay attention, sir,” she teased, and Ben gave in to the urge to kiss her, placing his hand on her thigh as he kissed her, and she immediately kissed him back, letting his entire hand span the tops of her thighs. She sighed into the kiss, and Ben slipped his tongue between her lips, tasting, remembering. It had been one day. One day since the lake house, and he’d missed her so much.

“Now who’s not paying attention,” he teased, pressing his forehead against her, because her hand was already so near his fly that he wished she would just touch him.

“You know what you are?” She asked, her lips still hovering close to his. “You’re impossible. Difficult.”

“Irresistible,” he said, which made Rey laugh as her fingers curled into his hair, tugging lightly at the strands.

“Must be a family trait,” she said, and all the happiness seemed to whoosh out of him when he said that. He withdrew his hand, immediately feeling stupid, feeling foolish, but refusing to acknowledge the emotion and pretended like nothing happened.

“Not as irresistible as Poe,” he practically spat out at her as Rey immediately scooted off the couch and walked off toward the window, like _he_ was the one who said the wrong thing. How did she do that?

“Nobody’s as irresistible as Poe,” she giggled, and Ben tried to swallow down the jealousy that was already trying to choke him. He wasn’t doing a good job. “Not even Poe.”

“Don’t tell him that when he wakes up later,” He stood up from the couch, because he needed a drink. He marched to the little drink cart Mitaka kept stocked, and saw he had ice and enough to make a gin and tonic. He offered Rey one, but he started making himself one before she could decline. She looked over her shoulder, bathed in sunlight still as she watched him. When he was done, he raised the glass to her and took a sip.

“Have you seen my favorite photo?” She asked, walking back to where her laptop was, and turned it to face it to him. Ben looked up from where he was about to take a sip of his gin and tonic and nearly spat it out when he saw the picture of himself. It was clearly an accidental shot, the camera was facing him and he was making the ugliest face ever. Rey laughed, and looked from his face and back to the photo.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” he told her. “Delete that.”

“He says it like I don’t have multiple copies,” she chuckled. “But I like this next photo, too.”

She pressed a button and the photo on the screen changed. This time, it was Ben sitting in the couch at the lake house, the sun setting around him. His brow was furrowed, but his gaze was to the camera, his hand draped over the back of the couch. Ben Solo in real life immediately frowned.

“You made me look good.”

“I didn’t make you look like anything,” Rey pointed out, taking a tiny sip from the drink in his hand before she gave it back to him, Ben considered the glass, noting the little soft rose lipstick stain she’d left on the rim. “That’s just how I see you, you know? Safe. Proud. Very hard to read.”

“An excellent kisser,” he asked, and Rey walked over to him and pressed her lips against his, as if to test that theory. He hastily placed the glass back in the drink cart so he could properly kiss Rey, could feel the sear of her lips against his, the swirl of her tongue, let his hand splay over her waist.

But all too soon, she pulled away from him, her cheeks flushed and her lips a little wet.

“Eh,” she shrugged. “You’re alright.”

“I’m no French boy but…”

“I will not accept disrespect of my nonexistent French boyfriend Philippe in this house,” Rey laughed, closing her laptop and neatly tucking it away. “Now pack up, Solo. I’m taking you out to dinner.”

“Why?” Ben asked, not wanting to say that he already had the address for their reservation at some fancy restaurant Hux had booked for the evening.

“You’re supposed to use part of your first paycheck to treat other people, it’s good luck,” she pointed out, pulling a literal check from her pocket to wave in his direction. “I think I can afford some fancy Manhattan food. Your pick.”

* * *

“This isn’t fair,” Rey said, even as she smothered her hotdog with ketchup, mustard, onions, pickles and every available condiment in the hotdog cart while Ben stood off to the side, nursing his own ketchup-ed hotdog and a can of Dr. Pepper.

“You said ‘my pick,’” He pointed out, but it was really hard to focus on eating his food when he watched Rey _inhale_ hers. “I know it’s not French Fries or snails or a baguette…”

She said something indecipherable in response, what with all the food in her mouth. Ben heard himself chuckle (imagine that!) and pulled tissue paper from the counter by the cart to hand it to Rey.

“Seriously, Ben. I have more than $20 in my pocket. Why choose a hotdog cart? And don’t stay it’s because you genuinely like it, because you haven’t eaten a bite of your food. Or that you felt bad for me, because I don’t accept that.”

“You’re putting words in my mouth,” Ben shook his head. “But I happen to like this hotdog stand in particular. Han and I used to hang out here while we waited for Mom to finish work.”

“How old were you?”

“Much too old to still be waiting for Mommy with Daddy,” Ben snorted, taking a bite of his hotdog. “But Han and I sat in that bench over there, and we waited. We’re both bad at talking so we just…sat. And waited. It was nice and quiet. Poe was off…being Poe somewhere else. And Han told me to make sure I always waited for the woman I loved. The least I could do.”

“You know I never really understood your relationship with your parents,” Rey pointed out as they sat on another bench. She tried to imagine Han and Ben sitting together for any length of time without fighting, without even speaking. It was really hard to picture. “You seem to like them well enough. But you avoid them on holidays, seem to hate it when they’re around.”

“I don’t hate them.”

“You call your dad, Han!”

“That’s just they way we are,” Ben shrugged. “There’s no horrible secret that split us apart, no big thing. Han has difficulty communicating, Mom communicates with everyone but those she loves the most. Poe likes to pretend that he doesn’t have a chip on his shoulder, and I have so many chips on mine you could build a whole computer with it. Yes, I was a difficult teenager, but who wasn’t? And Luke is an asshole, but he brought you into the house, and I can never hate him for that.”

Ben pressed his lips together, because he really hadn’t meant to say that, and now he had, and Rey was looking at him with an expression he couldn’t decipher. Was it happiness? surprise? Was she about to laugh at him?

“Luke can be an asshole sometimes,” she told him. “You know I made him coffee once? I think I just started living at your house, and I wanted to do something nice for him, so I asked Maz to help me make him a cup. I was so careful not to let it spill, to keep it hot. But when I finally got to him, he tossed the coffee in the bushes and handed me the empty cup because he only drank loose leaf tea.”

They both shared a laugh at that. And a lightness just took over Ben as they sat together in that little bench on Bryant Park, watching the time pass, just like it had years ago.

“You’re family,” Rey finally concluded, nodding. “I’m jealous.”

“You say that like you don’t belong with us,” he said, tossing his now empty soda can in the bin nearby. “With me.”

The shock on her face when he said that should have made him take it back, should have made her laugh and tell him to stop joking around. But Ben stood firm, and held his ground. And so what if he no longer knew if it was because of the billion dollar deal or just Rey? Those two things were completely separate and yet so intimately linked in the person sitting across him.

“Ben, you…what are you saying?” She asked him.

“You heard me perfectly well,” he said, looking away from her as he tossed the paper napkins in the bin too. “Anyway. I should take you home.”

“We should talk about this,” she said, and that was the last thing he wanted. He knew that if they talked he would tell her everything, how hard and fast he had fallen for her, how he had been thinking about her every day since she showed up at Poe’s bedroom, how he was selfish and wanted her all for himself, how he wasn’t screwing up a billion dollar deal, no matter how much she loved Poe.

How he wasn’t good. Not at all.

There had to be a villain in every story, and Ben had already taken the role wholeheartedly.

“I’ll take you home,” he said gently. “I have a car.”

Rey looked around the park briefly, as if she was trying to find an escape. He didn’t blame her.

“Okay.”

* * *

The ride home was extremely awkward. And took much longer than Ben was comfortable with. He had long toyed with the idea of buying a place in Manhattan so he didn’t have to be driving or sitting on his ass for a large part of the day, but…he couldn’t. Who else would make sure that the rest of his family didn’t get themselves in too much trouble? Who else would make sure that Poe was still in one piece? Too risky.

Nevermind that Ben felt that if he left that nobody would care.

Rey said nothing as she sat next to him. For how close they had been just the night before, today they were icy cold and separated, miles apart even when they were sitting next to each other.

“There’s someone on the driveway,” she said, her voice trailing off as the figure of Poe Dameron appeared. Although he still looked slightly pale, and his curls were looking a little flat, Ben’s brother was back and up an about. He didn’t know how to feel about it. He was dressed in a soft blue bed robe, with a cane. Oddly enough, it suited him. But then again, you were hard pressed to name one sartorial item that didn’t suit Poe Dameron.

Poe gave them a winning smile and held up his hand in a hello. Rey couldn’t unbuckle her belt fast enough and practically bolted out of the car.

“Poe!” She exclaimed, and the word lanced Ben in the chest. “How are you feeling?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note the change in number of chapters! Might go up or down, I am pantsing the heck out of all of this.


	9. Chapter 9

Rey had always been a patient person. She had been willing to wait for her family to come back for her in that car in the scrapyard much longer than they ever deserved, willing to wait for Poe to love her for years without him having to even looking at her.

And today, she could wait for Ben to tell her the truth about how he really felt about her. Whatever it was. It didn’t really matter, because she knew how she felt about him.

But that didn’t mean she wasn’t frustrated as fuck at the older Solo brother. Ben pulled her in as fast as he pushed her away, and while she loved him when he was close, Rey was surprised that she still loved him when he tried to push her away, because she knew he was just trying to protect her from whatever bad guy he thought himself to be. Lions didn’t ask to be villains in stories, or hunters in the wild, but they were what they were, and Rey had long accepted that about him. Rey didn’t think she’d been secretive about how she felt for him, and he for her.

So why did he still look like he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders?

They finally arrived back at the house, after that long drive from Manhattan. Rey always felt a sense of calm and peace ash over her when she saw the familiar gates to Solo mansion, even more so when the car pulled up in the driveway in front of the garage. As peaceful as she felt, Rey couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed. Why did it always feel like her moments with Ben were covered in a big old bubble, that popped every time they came home?

 _Because this was reality,_ her brain quickly supplied. Reality was that Rey didn’t belong up in Solo Tower with him, she knew that the moment she stepped in to his office and saw him scoff at a Rothko. She didn’t belong in the mansion, not in the dance floor with all the beautiful people. But she didn’t want to belong up in the garage either, or up the tree.

And wherever those worlds were, they all meant that she didn’t belong with Ben.

“There’s someone on the driveway,” she said, her voice trailed off, because she knew Poe Dameron Solo’s figure even from far away. Suddenly she was fourteen again, watching him from the swimming pool and feeling all her insides get warm and tingly. She wondered if that feeling would ever go away, but she had to admit, he still made her smile.

Ben’s face though, could have refrozen all the melted glaciers in the world, the way he glared at his brother through the windshield of the TIE. One would think, looking at them right now, that Ben didn’t love his brother at all, but he did, in his own way. Ben legitimately cared about Poe and his happiness, even if he would rather pretend to be the villain in his family story than to admit it. Rey wanted to laugh, because he was being surprisingly juvenile for a man ten years older than her.

She leaped out of the car. If someone told Rey-from-five-years-ago that she would one day get out of Ben’s TIE with him in the driver’s seat to say hello to Poe while he was beaming at her like she was the actual fucking sun, she would not have believed it. But it happened today, and it instantly made her smile back. Even if it didn’t mean quite the same thing anymore.

“Poe!” she exclaimed, coming up to him, completely aware that Ben was taking his sweet time getting out of the car. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I sat on two champagne glasses,” he chuckled, and Rey saw Han Solo in that smile of his. He shared that trait with his older brother, adopted or no. “I had to get away from the house. Mom fussed then got annoyed when I wouldn’t respond to her fussing.”

“That sounds like Leia,” Rey giggled, still aware that Ben had just turned off the engine.

“Dad said Ben took you out for dinner in the city?” Poe asked, his perfect brow arching in confusion. Rey decided then and there that she quite liked Poe with the scruff. It made him look more distinguished. Mature.

“Hotdogs,” Ben said flatly behind her. Rey didn’t dare look over her shoulder. “We had hotdogs.”

“Wow, Ben. One would think you could afford something a little more special for our Rey,” Poe said, and Rey knew he was teasing, but clearly Ben didn’t get the memo, because Rey could practically feel his anger radiating from behind her.

“I guess that makes me a garden variety asshole,” Ben muttered, and Rey wanted to roll her eyes. God, the subtext was so thick it filled volumes. _Just tell your brother how you feel, both of you!_ She wished she could smack their heads together. And Rey thought _she_ would be the one with difficulty communicating with others.

She’d learned very quickly that there was little point in beating around the bush about what you wanted because, survival. It was one of the things that ultimately convinced her to follow Chewie back to Solo mansion. Chewie had understood the need to be brief and blunt, and incredibly honest, and Rey had picked up that trait of his.

Unlike certain someones she was standing with today. Emotional repression was never good, but the Solos had it in spades.

“So what have you been the last couple of days?” Poe asked her, and Rey realized that he was holding her hand, and that Ben was staring at it like it was the devil incarnate. Rey squeezed Poe’s hand and smiled, because for all his bluster and flirtation, Poe was genuine the same way Ben wasn’t a liar. If he’d intended anything more than a friendly relationship with Rey, she would be informed of that face.

“Oh, this and that,” Rey shrugged, because honestly, she was not about to tell Poe that she slept with his brother at the Lake House.

“You know we never had that drink in the Solarium,” Poe pointed out, and really was he _trying_ to kill Ben then and there?

“You didn’t,” Rey smiled. “But Ben kindly stepped up to the plate.”

“Of course he did. Ben, are you heading back to the city?” Poe asked, tilting his head at his brother, who looked like he couldn’t decide between getting back in his car and ramming Poe with it, crying or stomping off.

“I think I’ll stay the night. Been a long day,” he said, and Rey didn’t mistake that look on his face as hurt. He was _hurt_ that Rey was holding Poe’s hand, when Rey had every right to be hurt that he couldn’t be bothered to tell her what he’d said at the Park, or what _you belong with me_ was supposed to mean. “Goodnight, Poe. Rey.”

Then with one last look at their hands, Ben sighed and turned to walk in the direction of the house. Rey wanted to reach out and pull him back, tell him that nothing was going on but resisted the urge. Ben had to trust Rey’s feelings, that she wouldn’t play Ben like this. And if he didn’t trust her, well, that was his problem.

“Is he gone?” Poe whispered, not looking over his shoulder as Rey watched Ben leave.

“Yes,” Rey sighed wistfully. “He’s gone.”

“Good,” Poe chuckled before he tucked Rey’s arm under his and they started to walk together in the direction of the staff quarters. “Because Han told me about the two of you.”

“What exactly did he tell you?” Rey asked, her cheeks getting hot, because how the hell did _Han_ even know?

“Just that you spent the night with him at the Lake House,” Poe chided, and laughed when Rey opened her mouth to deny it. “Oh please, Rey, don’t deny it. The Lake House is like a sex house for lonely bachelors and bachelorettes. Luke probably scored a LOT in that place before Ben came to live with him and cockblocked them both. And Ben brought home lobster rolls. He would never do that unless he was in a fantastic mood, and there was nobody else with him.”

God, she did not expect to talk to _Poe_ about this. But he was here, and she really needed a friend.

“I really like him, Poe,” she said softly. “He’s the last guy I ever expected that I would ever fall for…”

“Because you were in love with me for so long?” Poe asked, wriggling his eyebrows at her. “Come on Rey. I’ve known since you were fourteen.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” She gasped, elbowing him in the ribs, making him yelp in protest. They both laughed, and it was so nice to walk with Poe like this with that…pressure off. Did she know that he was a bit annoying? That he could tease like nobody else? She probably never would have known.

“What was I supposed to say? ‘Hey Rey, I know you’re in love with me, but I’m not the perfect guy you think I am?’” Poe shook his head. “Plus, who doesn’t love being loved? Certainly not me.”

He had a point there.

“I just…I don’t know how he feels about me,” Rey sighed. “And I can’t tell if he’s too embarrassed to tell me that he likes me too, or is too polite to tell me that he doesn’t.”

“A hard man to read, my brother,” Poe agreed, nodding.

“That’s it? You don’t have a big speech, a plan to tell me? No, ‘buck up, Rey, I’m sure he loves you too?’”

“I mean,” Poe shrugged. “I’ve never been the plan kind of guy. And I really don’t know if he does. If you find him hard to read, try being his brother. You’re love-able, don’t get me wrong. Any guy would be lucky to have you, and Finn tells me you’ve been texting him the funniest memes ever.”

“Yeah, I think I love your fiancee more than I do you at the moment, by the way,” Rey shook her head as they neared the apartment over the garage. The outdoor light was still on, and anyone standing by one of the windows of the house could have clearly seen them together. A certain tall, much too serious man too mysterious for is own good, for example. “I really don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

“To tell you the truth, neither do I,” Poe said. “But I like to think having been engaged three times before I actually found The One, I have the authority to tell you that you have nothing to worry about. We Solo guys, adoptees included, have a tendency to not quite believe it when we fall in love. We try to keep them as far away from our hearts as possible, because we think they these messed up, shriveled little things that don’t deserve time or attention. Ben and my mom especially, because they’re the ones that still think they can hold up the world on his own damn shoulders. It’s messed up, I know, but he’s always been that way. Just be there for him. He needs that.”

“You’re really bad at giving advice,” Rey frowned at him, moving so she faced Poe and frowned at him.

“I am spectacularly bad at giving advice,” he grinned at her, taking her hand again and giving the back of her palm a friendly kiss. Ordinarily Rey would have blushed, but she just rolled her eyes.

“He’s watching, isn’t he,” she said.

“Oh yeah,” Poe chuckled, and there went his eyebrows again. “I’ll see you tomorrow, friend.”

Somehow, hearing Poe Dameron Solo call her friend was a lot more satisfying than she ever imagined it to be. Rey laughed and said goodnight, echoing his sentiments.

* * *

The next morning, Ben was practically vibrating with anger from his seat in the backseat of the car. Han was up in front with Chewie, defying expectations from a rich man and his chauffeur, talking with his oldest friend about the old days, when Han used to steal from colonials overlords to return artifacts to their original owners. It was a poorly kept secret in the Solo family that Han was a bit of a Robin Hood in the sixties, dismissed as a fun fact mostly because he was a white guy who was born to the colonial overlords themselves.

“I think you’ll find _I_ was the one that made sure you didn’t die on that particular rescue mission,” Leia chucked from her place in the backseat because of course, as wild and riotous as her husband’s past had been, hers were even wilder.

“You never let me forget it, Princess,” Han Solo turned from his place in the front seat to grin at his wife, who smiled back at him all prim and proper.

Ben wanted to roll out of the car. Just open the door and let himself fall and crash to the pavement. And it wasn’t that he didn’t find his parents completely adorable. He did, which was why he wanted to not be in that tiny space with them being so adorable and him being SO. SINGLE. AS. FUCK.

Because Rey…Rey loved Poe. He’d seen it the night before, in the glow of her eyes in that dimmed driveway, in the way Poe made her laugh. They looked so easy and comfortable together, showing off the reasons why Ben couldn’t be in a room for too long as his brother—Poe was everything Ben was not. Charming, funny and kind, he was the favorite for as long as Ben had been the disappointment.

 _One billion dollars,_ he reminded himself as they finally made it to the office, and the cool sanctity of his space washed over him again, even if Leia and Han continued to banter all the way into her office one entire hallway away from his. He would have thought that his mother was much too preoccupied with Han to notice Ben being his usual sourpuss self, but he realized he’d greatly underestimated Leia Organa Solo when she marched into his office thirty minutes later, her dress fanning around her feet and her cup of coffee still hot in her hands.

Ben had been in the middle of speaking to Mitaka when she burst in, too.

“…plane tickets to Paris, one in my name and another for Rey Niima. I want them on the first flight tomorrow. First class.”

“Going somewhere, Ben?” Leia asked, as Mitaka awkwardly bowed at the two Solos and shuffled out of the office. Leia chuckled after him. “Your assistant is hilarious.”

“That’s why I keep him around,” Ben looked down at the paperwork he was signing (what the hell was he signing?) as he tried his best not to look at his mother. Leia was always known to carry around coffee in a tumbler whenever she was at work. She was always moving, always doing something, even when Ben was a kid. He loved the moments when he was able to distract her from her work, make her momentarily laugh or tell him off for something he did. But to have her energy and focus on _him_ , especially right now, it was the last thing he wanted.

“Ben,” Leia said slowly.

“Mom,” he replied with the same tone.

“Why are the Sevins in my office with no appointment?” Leia asked.

“What?” Ben asked, because that made him look up. The Sevins were traditional about certain things, among them being calling someone before you showed up anywhere, and this definitely didn’t count. “You just left them there?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, I left them with your father.”

“That’s not better,” Ben grumbled, getting up from his desk, trying to get his head in order, trying to think of why Finn’s parents and his future business partners would suddenly show up at their place of work.

“Oh give him some credit,” Leia shook her head, standing up. “I asked him to show them Poe’s office. The staff was using it as a break room so it’s not covered in dust.”

Ben grudgingly followed his mother’s request, setting foot in Poe’s office. Poe’s view was not as nice as Ben’s, but nice was relative when you were on the thirty third floor in Manhattan. Poe’s office also had a huge Jackson Pollock, purchased mostly because they could, and not because any of them particularly understood the value of paint randomly splattered on a canvas.

 _Rey would probably appreciate it, though,_ Ben thought, stepping inside the office and smiling politely at Finn’s parents. _Maybe I could have it sent to her, after all of this._

“Nice office,” Finn’s father commented, looking around. “A little generic, though?”

“It’s Poe’s, so…” Ben trailed off. He liked Finn’s father. He was a businessman, and he understood how business worked just as well as Ben did.

“Oh good, you’re here,” Han said, practically shooting up from his seat across from Finn’s mother. “Dana here was just showing me the invitations for the wedding. I can’t tell the difference between taupe or buff, they’re all nude to me. Leia, honey?”

Leia glared bloody murder at her husband, which only made Han grin in amusement as she sat next to Finn’s poor mother, who was holding up two equally beautiful invitations. Leia wouldn’t know the difference between taupe or buff unless someone put a label on either of them.

“Is there a problem, John?” Ben turned to Finn’s father, and the black man shrugged nonchalantly in the way that let Ben know that there was in fact, a problem, but John wasn’t about to get into it right away.

“I don’t know Ben. Is there?” John asked curiously, peering into Ben’s face like the truth could be divined there. Now Ben had been on the other end of many of those kinds of looks from various businessmen, but John seemed less inclined to believe Ben’s bullshit. But he had to stay the course. He was so _close_ to fixing his little problem. “I mean, from my end, there’s no trouble. Quite the opposite, really. There are so few opportunities for companies like mine to be this wanted by others, especially since I’m a man of color.”

“If there was anything we did to make you feel uncomfortable…”

“Oh it’s not that,” John waved it off. “But I’m saying a lot of companies want to work with me. Me, who came to this city thirty years ago with nothing but the clothes on my back and my lovely wife. I built this tech company to serve people who need it, and it feels different to be the one everyone wants this time around.”

Ben chose to say nothing, because it really wasn’t his place to comment.

“We received a proposal from First Order Media this morning,” John explained. “It was very impressive. You know them, Ben, don’t you?”

“Vaguely,” he said, because of course everyone knew that Ben used to work there until about seven years ago. Another part of his dark past. He glanced at his parents, who were watching him cautiously, as if they fully expected him to blow up. He didn’t.

“They were willing to give me cash and stock options, and full reign of my business, even after the merger.”

Ben wanted to laugh and scoff and tell John that the First Order strategy of giving the company everything they wanted only to fuck them over in the end was his brainchild. That the stock options and cash were temporary when the First Order outrightly hired each of your board members until you look back and realize you lost control of your own company while you were sleeping. Ben would have told John that regardless of if they were in business or not.

“You do realize that the First Order supported the Trump campaign,” Leia scoffed.

“Oh we’re well aware,” Dana, Finn’s mother said, putting aside the invitations. “We told them to shove the deal up their own ass.”

“I told them I was already in business with family,” John explained, getting right to the heart of the matter without really discussing it. Because of course, they saw Rey and Poe shamelessly flirting with each other at the party. ”Practically family, anyway. And I was happy to tell them that. Until my son came home last night, and we—“

“You. You overheard,” Dana insisted, rolling her eyes.

“I overheard him speaking with Poe. And I got the impression that Poe wasn’t as anxious to see Finn as he should be.”

“Since when were we in the business of controlling our children’s emotions, John?” Han chuckled, shaking his head like this wasn’t a huge problem. Because it was. “If only we could.”

“Yes well, my son has always been more sensitive than most, and I am in the position of making sure he will never, ever get hurt,” John said, and Ben could feel the passion fueling his words. He was a father, alright. He turned to Ben, then glanced at Han and Leia, and Ben understood that he was just trying to protect Finn.

And that instantly made him a better man than Ben.

* * *

He was out of time. Granted, he already knew what he had to do about Rey, and Poe and all of it. And he knew that doing this meant screwing himself over, especially after the things John Sevin said in the other room.

But he pulled out his phone anyway, and called Rey.

“Ben,” she said, and her voice felt so light and happy and soothing that he wished he could touch her. But he quickly stamped the emotion away, looking out at his gorgeous view of the city to keep himself grounded. “How do you know my number?”

“The same way I knew where to send my assistant in Paris,” he said.

“Spying?”

“My mother,” he said, making her laugh.

“Well to what to do I owe the pleasure of this call?” She asked, and Ben wished he was the kind of guy who could tell her everything. _I’m not giving up a billion dollars for you. I can’t. But I’m going to make sure you’re happy. You can hate me for the rest of your life. But this is for the best._ But he wasn’t.

“I was hoping to ask you to come up to the office this afternoon,” he said. “If you were free.”

Hesitation. Not good. “Ummm. There was something I had to do first, I was hoping to get it done by today.”

He clenched his fists, willing his heart not to hurt. Somehow, he knew it was about Poe. That kiss on the back of her hand last night had meant something between them, the entire plan hinged around Rey coming to his office this afternoon.

“Rey, I…” he said, knowing it was despicable, what he was doing. “I need you to be here. Please.”

He didn’t fake that hitch in his voice, because he really did need her. Needed to see her. One last time.

“Okay,” she finally said.

“Thank you. I’ll see you later,” he said, and threw himself into work. At some point Hux had come in to his office, stressing about what he was supposed to do now that he was accidentally living with his girlfriend. Ben might have said something, but couldn’t be arsed to remember what it was, only that Hux had looked both terrified and happy when he left the office, already asking Mitaka about the address to Tiffany’s. Ben might have had lunch at some point, might have discussed the details of the merger with his legal team, but again, nonw of it retained in his memory.

The next thins he knew, it was the afternoon, and Han walked in to Ben’s office. He once legitimately thought it odd that his father didn’t have an office in the damn building that had his name, but Han had just laughed it off and said the entire building was his office, so there.

“Our future in-laws were making a threat,” he announced to Ben.

“I’m aware. I was in the room too,” Ben pointed out, crossing his arms and glaring at his father. He was still standing, and Han was sitting across from him, tilting his head to one side and giving Ben a look that seemed to say, “I can’t believe that you came from _my genes_ ,” which to be honest, Ben couldn’t quite believe either.

“You already know what to do,” Han pointed out, because obviously, he knew his son well enough. “Is it going to be the kind of thing that’s reckless and stupid, or just reckless?”

“When you and mother decided to have children, was it a conscious decision on your part to never believe a word they say, or do I just inspire that in you?”

“Hey, sarcasm and derision is my way. Don’t try to copy my way,” Han shook his head.

“I have it under control,” Ben insisted.

“Under control, meaning…?”

“Things with Rey have…progressed,” he said, choosing his words carefully, trying to still sound impassive and uncaring, even if, who was he kidding, his Dad could probably see right through him. “She’s confided in me somewhat, and she trusts me.”

“And…?”

“I was going to ask her to go with me to Paris,” He said, playing with a crystal paperweight he had on his desk, a gift from Lando when he first started working for Solo Corp. “I was going to tell her that I needed a change in my life. Needed to slow down, figure out what I really want out of life.”

“She’ll believe you,” Han said, and it wasn’t so much as statement of fact as it was a warning.

“She will,” Ben agreed, because he chose not to heed the warnings. He needed to to do this. “We’ll fly out to Paris, Poe will come to his senses and realize that Finn is the love of his life, then I’ll fly back to New York to sign the merger, and you can buy a house in Tuscany for all I care.”

“We have a house in Tuscany,” Han pointed out, shaking his head as if Ben had once again, managed to disappoint him. What else was new? “What about Rey?”

“She’ll grow up. Realize that she’s better off without any of us and live happily in Paris like she was always meant to be,” Ben said, looking back at the documents on his desk but found he couldn’t find the urge to sign them.

“You’re going to ditch her?”

“Was there any other option?” Ben barked, his hand clenching around the pen so hard he thought it would snap. “There was never anything else. There was only the merger. If we don’t do this, millions of kids will lose out on the chance to get a quality education if we don’t get the partnership with Sevin.”

“There are ways to do that without hurting Rey in the process!”

“No there isn’t!” Ben roared back, pushing himself off the chair and pacing. “You or mom, you never understood, but this is what it takes to run a corporation like this! You have to make choices and sacrifices, and Rey is the sacrifice I—we have to make! She asked me not to give up on this deal. She sent me to Paris to deal with Rey. I’m your attack dog, your enforcer, and I have never heard either of you complain about it until Rey got involved!”

“We never meant for you to _hurt_ her, Ben.”

“Well you never gave a damn if it hurt _me_ before, did you?” Ben asked. “All these years I’ve worked for you, taking over businesses, and neither of you have ever seen the faces of those people we just took over. They look at me with hate and contempt, because _I_ took away their hard work. You’re out there celebrating with Chewie or thinking up new ways to spend our money.”

“Watch it, Ben,” Han told him, the same steel in his voice that Ben carried with him throughout his life. “Leia and I thought this was what you wanted. You know more than we do that Solo Corp. is as big as we need it to be. It’s the whole reason why we decided not to go public. It doesn’t always have to be more. We asked you to preserve the merger because you wanted it, and because we think Poe and Finn really do belong together. But you have to decide for yourself what you really want. Don’t pin this on me or your Mom.”

“Yes. And the two of you taught me everything I know.”

“Not this, kid. Not this.”

Han had already been out of Ben’s office for ten, fifteen minutes when Ben realized he was out of breath, and was slightly dizzy. He placed a hand over his chest and tried to regulate his breathing, tried to remember what not being in total panic was like.

Jesus, fuck. What a mess.

His phone beeped. Mitaka’s voice came through the speaker.

“Miss Rey just arrived,” he said. “Should I send her in?”

Fuck.

“Yes,” he said after taking a deep, shuddering breath. “Send her in.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're close to the end, guys! Can you taste the croissants and coffee already?


	10. Chapter 10

Rey found her hand was shaking a little as she hung up after Ben’s phone call. She’d always believed in instinct and foreboding, but this was different. His tone was…odd. There was that cool detachment when he first called, but then he’d quickly shifted when he used the worst word one could ever use on her.

Please. Rey could have lost everything on that singular please. But she didn’t know what the fuck was going on with him, and she didn’t like it. Not one bit.

“Everything okay?” Rose asked, scratching behind Hux’s cat Millicent’s ears as she and Rey sat in her friend’s new shared living room. Rose had invited Rey over to check out the new place after Rey explained she had a lunch meeting in the city. They were still in the middle of artisanal brick oven pizza and handmade pasta takeout (which Rey had to admit, was really good even on takeout) and white wine when Ben had called and made her stomach flip.

“That was Ben,” she said, frowning. “He wants me to go to his office this afternoon.”

“That was fast! Did you tell him about Paris?” Rose asked, her eyes wide in surprise as Rey sighed and sank back into her place on the comfy chair. At this point, Rose was the only one who knew about the result of her just-concluded meeting. Her old boss Dick Avery had set her up with a meeting with Jo Stockton, who was indeed writing a book full of profiles of the work areas in different women in the city, except she had just finished the draft of the New York edition of her book.

She was, however looking for a photographer for her Paris edition. And after their lunch meeting, Rey got the good news that she was going to be credited in a book and a salary to photograph women in their element for at least the next year, in Paris. _Don’t accept an advance when you can get a salary and a percentage of sale_ , Leia had advised her when Rey told her about the opportunity. It was too good a chance to pass up, and Rey had no plans of doing so.

“No, no, not yet,” Rey said, frowning. “I was going to call Jo and accept her offer when he called.”

But then her thoughts had immediately drifted to Ben, which was why she practically ate the entire margherita pizza herself, smothered in the spicy honey that came with their order. Could she really ask him to give up New York for her? Could they make it work long distance (she doubted it)? But Rey had the foolish hope in her heart that he would. That he would push his company aside for once, use all of that time he’d banked, take all those breaks he deserved for her. Maybe he could actually look up at a building and smile, look out at a view an appreciate it.

But Rey didn’t give voice to any of those thoughts and possibilities. Better not to disappoint herself and just keep eating her pizza.

Then he’d called. Like he knew. Impossible. The world wasn’t _that_ small, was it?

“Are you going to ask him?” Rose asked, pulling Millicent into her lap as the cat purred, totally under Rose’s spell. Rey had heard legends of Armitage’s cat never getting along with anyone, until Rose. Because while Rose looked sweet and lovely and was all of five feet two inches, she could be as scary as a six-four man with a knife if she wanted to be. Perhaps Millicent respected that energy.

“I don’t know,” Rey sighed, shaking her head. “I’m not planning on letting go of the job, or of him. But I don’t know if he would let go of what he has here.”

“He will,” Rose reassured her. “Oh, this is so exciting!”

“You’re not allowed to tell Armitage _anything,_ ” Rey told Rose. “I don’t know what happened that made the two of you so attached to the hip and practically married—“

“Oh please. This is a temporary living arrangement, hello?” Rose shook her head. “He’s not going to ask me to marry him anytime soon.”

And of course, that was all completely true, until some time later in the afternoon, when Rose got a call from Hux in the middle of their movie viewing, desperately asking Rose if she knew her ring size, because he was at Tiffany’s already and he wanted to be sure he got the right size.

“You’re WHERE!” Rose practically screamed into her phone. “Armitage Hux, what in the hell are you doing ring shopping at Tiffanys’!”

Rey took that as her cue to exit, waving goodbye to Millicent and walking the five blocks from Hux’s apartment to the Solo building, thinking about her next move. She knew she was going to have to discuss this with Ben, but it just felt like there were so many other conversations they needed to have before this. Do you even want me? What did that night at the Lake House mean? Do you want to kiss me again? Then maybe they could start talking about Paris.

 _Run away with me,_ Rey wanted to tell him. _I have work that will sustain us both. I could show you my Paris._

But as she stood in front of Solo Corp. Tower, seeing his name on a plaque of important names that kept this company running, Rey’s little Parisian dreams looked less and less likely.

She made it up to the thirty third floor, smiling politely at Mitaka as she did.

“Ah Mademoiselle Rey,” he said, and hearing French again after being away from the city for a week was almost jarring. She was taken aback, but only momentarily. “Ca va?”

“Ca va,” she replied, smiling at him. “Parlez-vous toujours français?”

“Un petit peu,” he was obviously delighted that Rey was conversing with him. “I’ll let him know you’re here.”

“Merci,” She gave him a little wink before Mitaka let her in to Ben’s office where he looked…like he didn’t want to be there at all. Rey didn’t know what to make of the stiffness of his shoulders, the clench of his jaw, the way he stared at her like he couldn’t bear to look at her, but couldn’t look away from her either.

Did he know?

“I was worried about you,” he said, that little knit in his brow not loosening one bit, even as Rey closed the door behind her her and found herself leaning against it. She was nervous. Her her heart was hammering in her chest, and she knew perfectly well why. She was perhaps the one in this non-relationship who knew why she was feeling the way she did, because looking at him, it was almost possible that he didn’t feel the same way.

But could someone who didn’t feel the way she did about him kiss her the way Ben did?

“Worried…about me?” She wished she could touch him again, kiss him to remind him that _I want you, silly boy. Nobody else._ “Why?”

“Why not?” He asked, and ah, deflection. A classic Solo move. She’d seen Han do it more than once when Leia was asking him a direct question about something he would rather not talk about.

“I asked you first,” she told him, and why was her voice all shaky?

“I asked you second,” he said gently, coming up to stand in front of her. And god, if Ben so much as touched her she was sure she was going to kiss, him. Take his gigantic arms in her hands, straddle him with her legs and kiss him like there was no tomorrow.

She sucked in a breath as he looked deeply into her eyes. It reminded her of that night at the Lake House, where there was nobody else in the world but the two of them.

“I thought you didn’t want to come here,” he said, his voice soft and gentle, and so warm and caring that Rey wondered why she had never loved him at any point of her life until now. Why did it take her so long to see him? “That I was forcing you.”

“No, I was…” she said, inhaling sharply as she danced away from their close quarters, walking toward the windows. Windows and views, that was their thing, apparently. “I was just wandering around Manhattan, trying to sort out some thoughts.”

“Thoughts like…?”

“I don’t know,” she said, and that was exactly what you said when you knew what you wanted to say but didn’t feel good about saying it. “I have this nagging feeling that at some point in my life I am going to stop seeing you again, ever, which is ridiculous. You’re my…I mean we…we grew up together, and then there’s the other things. I mean I know we only had that one night, and it’s literally been three days, but…”

She inhaled sharply, because every breath around him was sharp, and he was right there, looking at her, and she couldn’t speak. Couldn’t form the words to say what she wanted, because despite all her bravado, she had never ever had to ask anyone for anything. Leaving the car in Jakku had been offered to her. Paris had been offered to her. But this? Ben Solo? She was asking for his love, and she couldn’t say the words out loud.

“I asked you first,” she repeated, because she needed a moment, and he looked like he had something to say.

“You did,” he said, and he stuffed his hands in his pockets and smiled. It was only for a second, and mostly for himself, but Rey saw it. Knew it was meant for her. “I had something to say.”

“You did?” She turned away from the window completely to face him. “You did. I remember.”

“But you were saying…something,” he said, teasing her still, and she hated that he was in control of this situation. “And it makes what I have to say seem silly and irrelevant.”

“Ben, you’ve never said a silly word in your life,” Rey practically admonished him, and he was walking to her again.

“Of course I have,” he said, standing in front of her, and she touched him. pressed her hand to his cheek, brushed the skin there. Looked up at the soft black locks of hair that her fingers already knew so well. She released a shuddering breath as his face came closer to hers. “Moist.”

He kissed one of her brows.

“Skedaddle.”

“When have you ever used the word ‘skedaddle’ in a sentence,” she laughed, as he pressed his lips against her forehead.

“It was the name of a company we were interested in buying,” he explained. “And don’t interrupt me.”

“Sorry,” she whispered.

“Pingpong,” he continued, catching her lips in his. “Lobster roll.”

Then the words all seemed to face away, because she was in his arms, softly kissing Ben Solo like they didn’t have monumental choices to make, like they didn’t anything else outside their door. What was it about them that made the world just fall away?

“Run away with me,” Ben finally said, his forehead pressed against hers, his breath sweet on her skin as her lips still tingled with his kisses. “Come away to Paris with me, Rey.”

That was it. It was everything she needed to hear, exactly what she wanted him to say. But something felt off about it all, and Rey’s head immediately spun, even as she used her hands on his arms to steady her.

“Please,” he said in that soft voice.

“Ben, I…” she struggled to find the words. “I just came back.”

“Then we’ll leave again tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow!” She exclaimed, “Ben, are you serious?”

“Serious as a living heart donor,” he said, and they kissed again, and Rey gave in to the urge to pull him in closer, to thrust her hands through his hair and tug a little, because she was so incandescently happy for the two of them. Could practically picture them together, sitting in a cafe, walking down the streets she loved so much. He would hate having his photograph taken, but Rey wouldn’t be able to help herself. They would be so happy.

“Ben you’re going to love Paris,” she promised him. “I’ll show you all my favorite spots, and maybe you could find your own. It’ll be amazing, you’ll see.”

Ben held on to her a little bit longer, a little bit tighter, but Rey was too buzzed with energy to stay in one spot. She wriggled from his arms to pace, but kept coming back to him, and laughing. Sure she was thinking about all of this with rose-colored glasses, but didn’t she deserve to think about it that way? Didn’t she deserve to get everything she ever wanted for herself?

“God I thought I was so smart, and all of this is Poe’s fault!” She laughed, still unable to believe that this was happening, that she was going to be so happy with him in the place that accepted her, with a man who wanted to run away with her. “I loved him so much, and I left New York because I needed to be away, then I took all those stupid walks, took all my stupid pictures…”

“Those pictures weren’t stupid,” he said weakly.

“No, they weren’t. You’re right, they weren’t. But all this time, I thought I became so smart and mature and sophisticated,” she shook her head. “Only for me to come back here and fall in love with you of all people, and now I’m stupider than ever.”

“I loved you from the moment you came into my life, I think,” Ben told her, and his voice tapered off slightly at the end.

That was when his entire face changed. Like someone had flipped a switch, and suddenly someone else was standing in front of her, someone who was much more cold and distant, someone who didn’t belong in the Parisian sunshine with her.

“Fuck,” Ben Solo shook his head. “Rey, I can’t do this.”

“What?” her brows knotting together, confused.

“I can’t,” he said, shaking his head even more. And just like that, Rey knew she was stupid. Stupid enough to believe that she was finally allowed to realize her dream, stupid enough to believe that Ben was exactly what she needed.

Rey was a fool who tried to keep it together, tried to keep her little dream alive, even if Ben, Ben who had given it to her was taking it away just as fast.

“Fuck, Rey, I thought I could do this to you, but I can’t.”

“What’s going on, Ben?” She asked him.

“That night in the Solarium,” he said, and suddenly he was cut off and cold, as far away from her as he could be without actually leaving the room. “I sent myself to deal with you. Poe had no idea. There was a deal on the line, a merger with the Sevins that can change a lot of lives. You knew that. And I wasn’t going to give it up.”

She sucked in a deep breath, because there was nothing else inside her to hold her up anymore. Ben had taken away the floor from underneath her, had made her so happy and then betrayed her so utterly in that short amount of time.

Solo men didn’t do anything by halves, did they?

“So I spent time with you, to distract you, to get you away from Poe,” he continued. “But I was wrong. I miscalculated. I was going to take you to Paris then leave.”

She took a step back, holding on to the one emotion she had left in her arsenal. anger. Pure, unadulterated, riotous anger. The kind that made her want to claw at him and push him away, farther and much more harsh than he had. She had been so wrong about him. All this time she thought Ben Solo wasn’t a liar. He couldn’t be. It took him breaking her heart for her to see that he absolutely was. That everything he told her about him being a villain was absolutely true.

His face remained cold, but Ben had looked away from her now. She wondered what he was thinking. She hoped he was just a little bit scared of her.

But then Rey could feel salt against her lips, and fuck. She was crying. She didn’t want to cry in front of him. Not again.

“You were just going to leave me in Paris?” She asked. “After everything that happened?”

“No,” Ben said, quick to respond, and she didn’t understand that. “No, of course not. There is an apartment waiting for you in the first arrondissement, and a bank account. One million euros.”

She chuckled coldly. “Your first offer was better.”

“You can have more if you want,” he said, and she didn’t understand this sudden consideration of her, when clearly it had been the last thing on his mind when he started all of this. He wanted her to leave? Well she was going to do just that.

“I don’t want more,” she said, because the only thing she wanted from the Solo family now was their eldest son, and that was never going to happen. Rey had officially lost the only family she ever had, and it was all thanks to him. Ben Solo, the man who had broken her heart irreparably. “I don’t want any of it, and certainly not from you.”

She took her bag, when she realized that she never took off her jacket. Ben was staring at her with those dark brown eyes and that impossible to read face, and for the first time in fifteen, eighteen years, Rey wished she never left that junkyard in the first place.

“This is business, Rey. This is what I do.”

“Of course it is,” she said when all she wanted to tell him was to go fuck himself. “I’m going to take that ticket. It’s the least you can do.”

“Mitaka already sent you the details,” he assured her.

“You can’t even let me have the last word, Ben?” she shook her head.

“I’ll drive you home,” he said, because clearly the answer was no. He wasn’t going to. But Rey was angry and stubborn, and she was a fully mature adult who could keep it together long enough to make the perfect exit.

“No, asshole.” she said, so firmly and coldly that she actually saw him take a step back. Rey felt a sick sense of satisfaction at seeing that little bit of fear in her eyes. “You won’t.”

Then she left the room, leaving Ben Solo behind.

* * *

Rey’s tears had completely dried up by the time she made it backed to cursed Solo mansion. Every instinct in her told her that she needed to scream, or shout, or break a thing or two, but honestly, what did she have left to break?

“Hey, there’s our girl!” Poe exclaimed as Rey stepped into the billiards room, where Finn had stopped himself from lining up a shot at the pool table to beam at Rey while Poe was nursing a champagne glass and smiling at her like he was happy to see her.

“Finn, you’re back,” Rey managed to say, accepting a hug from her hew friend. It was good to know Finn gave good hugs, because she needed on right about now. “Wait, wait, don’t let go yet.”

“You okay?” Finn asked, pulling away slightly, and Rey thought it was sweet the Finn noticed her distress right away. He was a doctor, after all.

“Uh oh,” Poe said, coming over and handing Rey a flute of champagne. “Where did you just come from.”

“Manhattan,” Rey tried to say brightly as possible, but saying the word just brought her right back up to the thirty third floor of Solo Tower. “I had a job interview with Jo Stockton, and I passed! I’m flying to Paris tomorrow.”

Finn had exclaimed delight and congratulations right away, but Poe Dameron Solo was not to be fooled.

“One way?” he asked darkly, and Rey simply smiled and nodded at him, finishing her drink in three gulps.

“First class,” she added.

“By yourself?” Poe asked, and she didn’t think love and friendship could sound as protective as when Poe asked her, but she felt it anyway, and nodded.

“You don’t seem too happy for her, Poe,” Finn teased.

“I’m going to miss her, that’s all,” Poe said, giving her a small smile like he understood exactly what happened, which was impossible, wasn’t it?

“She’ll be back for the wedding, of course,” Finn said, squeezing Rey’s hand and making her smile at him again. “You will, won’t you?”

“I’ll see if I can,” she said, already knowing fully well that there was no way that she could come back for that. No matter how much she cherished her newfound friendship with the future Mister and Mister Solo.

“Oh come here,” Poe said, wrapping her in his arms in a tight hug. He pulled Finn in to the hug too, and this time Rey really did start crying again. “You have a good trip, okay, Rey?”

“I will,” she nodded to them. “Finn, I…”

“I know I’m missing something here,” he said to her, his face serious as he didn’t let go of either Poe or Rey. “Babe, you need to fill me in on the details. But if you need me, just call. I’ll fly to you, with our without Poe. You’re family now, Rey. And we’re not just going to let you leave.”

“Thanks Finn,” she said weakly, and accepted the hug again. And as Rey left the billiards room, left Solo Mansion, she steeled herself for some more difficult goodbyes to come.

* * *

“Fuck,” Ben groaned when he arched his back, slowly turning his neck to fight the stiffness there. He’d fallen asleep at his desk after working overtime to draft the new amendments to the merger. He caught a glimpse of the time on his phone and knew Mitaka was already on the other side of the door, getting his own coffee and waiting for Ben to come to the office, until Ben called him in.

“Boss!” He exclaimed, as Ben stood from his desk and took off his jacket, loosened his tie. He knew he had spare clothes somewhere in the office, he just didn’t know where.

“Mitaka,” he said gruffly. “You’re here.”

“As are you, sir.”

“I’m aware,” Ben said dryly, unbuttoning his cuffs and rolling up his sleeves, because what else could he do, really. He ran a hand through his hair and wondered what state it could be in for Mitaka to be looking at him like he’d grown a second head. Not know that it wasn’t a second head, it was an unruffling. A come undone moment. After all that time walking through a fog, the light had finally broken and Ben knew what he had to do.

Rey wasn’t going to lose anything. Not again. Not if he had anything to say about it.

“I need Hux and the Sevins in the conference room for a meeting as soon as possible. If you manage to get a hold of Poe, I need to talk to him too. I want you to transfer my ticket to Paris to Poe’s name, and I need to see my parents as soon as they come in.”

“BEN!” A voice roared through the hallway, and Ben nearly jumped. He’d heard his brother angry before, but never here, and never at that ferocity. It took a lot to get Poe angry.

“Poe,” Ben said as Mitaka shuffled out of the room and closed the door behind him. Ben honestly hadn’t seen his brother that upset, at least not since that one time when they were in kindergarten, when Ben told him they needed to shave his head because he had lice. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

“Me too,” Poe said before he reared back and punched his older brother across the face, sending six foot four Ben reeling backward against his desk. He stumbled, and tasted blood. What the fuck.

“Jesus, fuck, Ben,” Poe shook his head, shaking out the hand he used to punch him. “Is your face made of marble? Shit!”

“What the fuck, Poe?” Ben asked, using the back of his hand to wipe the blood off of his mouth. Poe packed a pretty serious punch.

“I’ve watched you for years, when you were doing those shitty business deals with the First Order, when you took over company after company here, and I thought that my brother would at least have _some_ morals about fucking over his own family, but I was so fucking wrong.”

Ben realized that of course Poe found out about Rey. She must have run to him immediately. Was she in tears? How badly had Ben hurt her?

He shook his head and refocused. Too late for regrets now. He was the villain in this story, and he had to act accordingly. Ben staggered when he tried to get away from the range of Poe’s punch, but managed anyway.

“How could you do that to her, Ben,” Poe shook his head. Ben hadn’t expected the disappointment oozing off of his baby brother. “How could you hurt her like that? And why…?”

“Why?” Ben asked, because finally he had an answer to that. A proper response, one that everyone expected of him. “Because I had to. This is what I do, Poe. I don’t understand why any of you expected anything less from me.”

Poe’s face fell then, and Ben didn’t know what to make of that. Nor did he care. He was about to make his brother the happiest man alive, and Ben didn’t care if Poe reciprocated with a smile or a snarl.

“I want you to fly out to Paris with her,” Ben said. “Her plane’s leaving in a few hours, but if you leave now you’ll make it.”

“What?”

“I don’t want her to feel abandoned, you have to fly with her,” Ben insisted, feeling a bit of panic rise inside his chest. He needed to make a case for Poe to get everything Rey every wanted, everything Ben ever wanted, and it was tearing him apart, but Rey couldn’t leave New York by herself. It would crush her, and maybe do irreparable damage to her relationship with the rest of his family. “She shouldn’t be alone.”

Rey could have them all, if that was what she really wanted.

“And I think you’ll like Paris. I’ve heard nothing but good things about it,” Ben continued, still unable to understand the confusion and caution on Poe’s face. “You’ll make her happy.”

“Me?” Poe asked.

“Yes, you,” Ben insisted. “You’re the only thing she’s ever wanted. And I saw the way you looked at her the other night, so…there. But you have to go now. She probably thinks we left her, and…”

“What about the Sevins? Your billion dollar deal?”

Ben’s face darkened, and he felt every hour he didn’t sleep. He looked away from his brother feeling shame wash over him. Punishment came where it was due.

“Their tech is solid, I’m sure they’ll find another partner,” he assured his brother.

“One better than Solo Media?”

“Yes,” Ben hissed, lying through his teeth. Anything to make sure his brother finally got up off of his ass and got the girl. What more did Poe need?

“You would blow a billion dollars for me?” He asked, his eyes wide with shock.

“For the both of you,” Ben said softly, looking down at his hands. “Poe, you really have to go.”

“I know, I know,” Poe said, holding his hands up in surrender. He gave ben one last, almost confused look, but he nodded anyway. “I’m going.”

Then he left, closing the door behind him. Ben dropped his forehead on his desk and tried to remember how to breathe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to say a quick THANK YOU to everyone who has kudos-ed and commented on this story so far! I haven't been the most diligent when it comes to responding to comments, but please know I see them all, and they all make my already warm heart even warmer. :) 
> 
> I have loved writing this AU, even when I was getting lazy to write it, and I love that you guys seem to enjoy it too!


	11. Chapter 11

  
The Falcon roared as it pulled up to the curb of the airport, and with a little jolt, Rey realized that this was it. The end of her time with the Solos, the start of her new life. Her chest tightened, and her heart twisted, even as she told herself that this was a good thing, that this was better. She didn’t need to have family weighing her down. She had lived on her own for most of her life, she could certainly do it still. 

Let her pride warm her up on the coming cold, lonely nights. 

“Alright. Airport,” Han said, killing the engine. He’d insisted on driving Rey to the airport himself, only because Chewie was too angry to operate heavy machinery, and Luke had not had a drivers license since the eighties. “I’ll get your bag.”

“Han, it’s fine, I can…”

“Let me do this for you, kid,” Han said, his face suddenly serious as he turned to her. “Not quite ready to say goodbye.”

She nodded and let him go, sighing to keep the tears from filling her eyes. She pulled Chewie’s arm just as he was about to go help Han. 

“Hey,” she told him. “Please don’t be angry with Ben.”

“Someone has to be,” Chewie growled. “You can’t let him get away with this.” 

“I’m not letting him getting away. My leaving is going to hurt him more than it will me,” she said, and that was the truth. Ben was the kind who never seemed to stop to analyze or acknowledge how he was really feeling, until it caught up with him much later on. Rey didn’t like the idea of him hurting, but knew there was nothing she could do about it. Nobody was going to be able to fix this but Ben. 

“Still,” Chewie insisted. 

“Just say you’ll miss me,” Rey smiled. “And that you’ll come and see me.” 

“I will,” he said. And while Chewie was never the type to say much, those two words meant more to Rey than anything else he could have said to her. Then he bent down and gave her a warm, tight hug. “You’ve always been good at surviving. I want you to *live,* Rey. Be happy.”

“I will be,” Rey promised him. “I will.” 

Then Chewie gave her a brisk nod and pat the top of her head with his massive palm, just like he did when she was a lot younger. It actually made Rey laugh. Chewie looked up suddenly, as did Rey, and Luke was there, his brows furrowed as he watched them. She didn’t know if he was trying to memorize her face or was trying to erase her completely. 

“Luke?” Rey asked curiously. 

“Rey,” Luke said, keeping his brow knotted. “You can stay, you know. You don’t need to run away just because he told you to.”

“He didn’t…Luke. I need this too,” Rey smiled at him. “I’ve loved staying with you and the rest of the family, but…I think I belong in Paris. I already have an apartment and a job lined up there. I’ll be fine.” 

“Okay,” Luke nodded. “Take ten million dollars, then.”

“What?” Rey’s eyes grew wide, but Luke’s face didn’t change. He was serious. Completely serious. 

“Rey,” he sighed, his shoulders dropping slightly. “I made a *lot* of money in my time. More than I need, and more than I deserve, really. I’ve been working with Poe and the lawyers. Most of it I already gave away, to people who need it more. But I want you to have ten million. Do whatever you want with it. Use it it live. Use it to be happy.” 

“Luke, I don’t…”

“Rey,” he said in a tone that brokered no argument. “Cutting one person off doesn’t mean cutting off your whole family. And that’s us. We’re your family.”

“I know,” she nodded, because for all her reservations, she knew that the Solos would have her back when she needed them. “But I think Ben needs you more right now.”

“He doesn’t deserve you,” Luke muttered darkly. “Do you love him?” 

“Yes,” she said, and ignored the tears that immediately sprang to her eyes at the confession.

“God. That bastard—“

“Is your nephew, and you love him as much as I do.”

“I don’t know about *as much*,” he mumbled as Rey threw her arms around him in a right hug. Luke reciprocated the gesture, but with a much gentler touch. “À tout à l'heure, Rey.” 

*I’ll see you soon.*

Rey could only smile and nod. That was when Han came up to her with a frown on his face and her bag. 

“Don’t be a stranger, kid,” he said, holding an index finger up at her like he was telling her off. “I mean it.” 

“I won’t,” Rey said softly, taking her bag from him. Suddenly Han’s phone began to ring, and he grumbled at the name on the caller ID and put the phone away. “Shouldn’t you get that?”

“It’s the office. It can wait.”

They didn’t need to say more than that. Rey never thought she would ever see her father again, but she got more than she ever bargained for with the three men standing here for her, saying goodbye. She gave them one last wave before going off to the gates, keeping her head held high all the way to the boarding gate, when she finally settled in to her seat, held her head in her hands and started to cry. 

***

“What’s this about?” Han asked, marching in to the executive floor of Solo Tower, only to be met with the faces of Finn’s equally confused parents and his eternally unfussed wife. 

He’d rushed here from the airport because in Mitaka’s words, it was “an emergency meeting” of the “utmost importance.” Han thought that unless someone was here to talk about a plan to get Rey to come back from Paris, or knock some sense into his eldest, they shouldn’t bother. But he came anyway, because he was that kind of guy. 

He met Leia’s eyes, as if she’d heard his thoughts. She frowned slightly. 

“How is Rey?” She asked him softly, gently, with a voice she reserved only for family. Han matched her frown, squeezed her hand even as he looked away, always uncomfortable talking about the things that mattered. 

“She’s fine,” he assured her, only he knew and understood how worried Leia had been about Rey. When they heard what Ben had done, she insisted that they needed to be there for her, and someone needed to stay here for Ben. And while Han still felt largely ill-equipped to being a father, thirty two years and two and a half kids later, he was glad to have her by his side for all of it. 

Leia nodded, and to her that was like a sigh of relief. 

“What’s going on?” John Sevin asked, just as Mitaka appeared at the lobby, asking the adults to follow him, presumably to Ben’s office. 

“If we knew, we would tell you,” Leia reminded him, as they walked in to Ben’s office, and Han saw for the first time exactly what hurting Rye had cost his son. Ben looked devastated, staring off in the middle distance away from them, slumped into his seat, like he was completely drained and exhausted. Han wanted nothing more than to tell his son to snap out of it, that he didn’t have to do this. 

But there was nobody who could pull Ben out of this other than Ben himself. His son looked up from where he was sitting, and there was a moment when father and son exchanged looks. Han could swear he saw Ben’s lip tremble like he was a little boy who had scraped his knee, asking Han for help. 

The moment was gone before he could fully understand it, and suddenly Ben Solo was there again, completely unruffled and unfussed, if a little subdued. 

“What’s going on, Solo?” John asked, as Ben stood up from where he was sitting and slowly made his way to them. 

“Armitage?” Leia asked, looking at the sitting area where the redhead lawyer was sitting and holding what looked like a substantial pile of papers. Not a good sign. “What are you doing here?”

“I…work here,” he said slowly and Han rolled his eyes. 

“She means this office, you dolt,” he said. 

“Just a minute, John. Everything will make sense in a moment,” Ben insisted. He glanced over at Hux who gave him a single nod, and Ben started to pace, the way he did when he was feeling frustrated or agitated, and trying not to let it get to him. “I felt the need to gather you all today to discuss the status of this merger. John, while I was really looking forward to our working together…”

“Was?” 

“Certain circumstances have come to light to change the situation,” Ben continued, and Han was nearly bowled over. What had Ben done this time? “Poe…”

“Is here, don’t worry everyone,” Poe announced, bursting in to the room, looking a little…disheveled, which Han was sure he had never seen from his younger son before. He looked a little nervous too, and looked behind him, to where Finn was standing, holding his hand and giving his fiancee an encouraging nod. “Sorry we’re late. Got a little sidetracked.” 

Han turned to Ben, who looked completely stunned to see them, his eyes flashing with panic as he focused his gaze on the boys’ clasped hands. 

“Poe, what the hell are you doing here,” he gasped, and Han saw his son’s facade break again. Poe fixed him with a stern glare. Clearly Han had missed something between his two boys. 

“Fixing your problem, dear brother. Clearly you need it,” Poe huffed, exchanging another knowing look with Finn before he joined his parents in the sitting room. Now Han had never liked being the last to know things when he was in a room, and he could only imagine how Ben felt to be completely thrown for a loop by *Poe* of all people. While the family was used to Poe being a bit of an unpredictable element, they always forgot just how unpredictable he could be. “Hello John, Dana. Lovely to see you both again. Hugs, you ready?” 

“I told you not to call me that,” Armitage muttered, bending down to pull a completely different stack of papers from inside his briefcase. “I graduated from Standford Law.”

“So did Finn. Well, Stanford Med. Ben was in Yale. I graduated from NYU, I don’t know why we’re talking about this,” Poe said. 

“I don’t know what we’re talking about, period,” Leia muttered next to Han, who couldn’t help but chuckle, content to sit back and watch. Clearly Poe had everything well in hand. 

“Poe, where’s Rey?” Ben’s voice got a little more desperate, almost like he was pleading with his brother to produce the said girl from the inside of a hat. “You were supposed to go with her.”

“Was I?” Poe asked nonchalantly. “I don’t recall.” 

“Poe, god damn it.”

“Benjamin Solo, you do not swear in a business meeting,” Leia said, and Han made sure to keep his mouth shut before he reminded his wife of the number of times she’d sworn like a sailor when her patience hit its limit. She then turned to Poe. “This *is* a business meeting, isn’t it?” 

“Yes, of course,” Poe nodded, reaching out a hand for Hux, who handed him a stack of papers, and passed copies on to everyone else. Han looked down at the title on his sheet. 

“The Sevin-Solo merger?” He asked, his eyebrow raised. 

“Yeah. Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?” Poe asked. “Especially after Finn and I register our marriage. We’ve eloped by the way. At City Hall. Just this morning.” 

“WHAT!” Han didn’t know who said it louder, Dana, Leia, John or Ben, but Ben was practically shaking with rage where he stood. 

“What?” Poe asked innocently. “We’ve been planning it for months, haven’t we, babe?” 

“Guilty,” Finn grinned, his eyes reserved only for his fianc—husband, Finn was Poe’s husband. 

“Welcome to the family, Finn,” Han said, clapping a hand on his new son-in-law’s shoulder. They exchanged smiles, and immediately Han knew his son had chosen right. “It’s going to be a wild ride.” 

“Don’t I know it,” Finn grinned. 

“Anyway, congratulations to us, I know.” Poe said, waving a hand and the copy of the merger in his hand around. “Now can we talk about this merger, or what?” 

“You didn’t go with her,” Ben said, clearly the boy’s mind was on a singular track as his face turned white as a sheet. “You left her!” 

“I didn’t leave her,” Poe’s face got dark as he glared at his brother. “You did. Dad dropped her off at the airport, didn’t you, Dad? How did she seem?” 

Han pressed his lips together. Rey had put on a brave face, but he had known the kid long enough that he knew that it was just a face she put on until everyone stopped looking. 

“Rey is heartbroken, kid,” He said to Ben. “It wasn’t a pretty sight.”

“Fuck,” Ben said immediately, running his hands through his hair. “I have to…I mean, I don’t…does she even want to see me, after what I did to her?” 

“Who’s Rey?” Dana asked. 

“The chauffeur’s daughter,” Hux said in a bored voice. 

“Hux, I swear to fucking god, do not call her that.” Ben snapped, pointing a finger at his lawyer the exact same way Han had at the airport. 

“She’s family,” Leia sighed. 

“She’s the love of Ben’s life,” Finn finally announced. “I don’t know what Rey sees in him, but she feels the same way.”

“She what?” Ben asked, his shoulders dropping, and Han could swear his son was on the verge of tears. Still very much a little boy. 

Han realized that Poe was watching his brother just as closely as he was, a little smirk on his face at the sight of his brother’s suffering. “Is that what Rey told you?” 

“Yes, because she told us *everything,*” Finn said, the last word implying something that was way over Han’s head, and something he didn’t want to think about further. 

“Han, you took her to the airport,” Ben whirled to face Han, frantic. “Did you talk to her? Did she say anything?” 

Han grinned, mostly because it became clear as day to the rest of the room what was going on. And while Ben claimed that he never needed his father’s help, Han liked to think he still had a few tricks up his sleeve. 

“Yeah, I drove her to the airport,” Han said, leaning back against his seat, crossing his ankles on the coffee table in front of him. He saw Leia roll her eyes and Poe rise his eyebrow as if to say, ‘are you really going to do that? Your funeral.’ “I said goodbye, gave her a little change to get something nice at the snack bar. I think I wished her luck, but I really don’t remember.” 

“What,” Ben glowered. 

“I know I smiled and I told her not to worry. You’ve always been a generous kind of guy, and I’m sure you compensated her well enough for whatever she did for you.” 

Years of experience in fighting had taught Han that the first guy to swing a hit was the least accurate. As his son actually raised a fist and swung to hit him, Han quickly ducked his head to the side, just enough for Poe to step in and catch his brother’s weight. And because Ben’s rage was always stronger than his own sense, he took a wing at Poe, who tumbled back and made everyone else exclaim and stand up. 

“I *knew* it, I fucking knew it!” Poe was actually grinning as he wiped a bit of blood off his lip. “You love her! You are actually in love with Rey. You idiot.”

“What?” Ben asked, shaking out his bruised fist. 

“I don’t know why we had to resort to violence to prove it,” Leia said beside Han, rolling her eyes as Finn helped Poe up. “Look at him, he can barely string two sentences together.”

“Yes I can,” Ben said slowly, carefully like he was making a lot of effort to do so. 

“Is he packed?” Poe asked a seemingly invisible force in the room when Han realized Mitaka had been hovering nearby. Jesus. What a creepy guy. 

“Yes,” he said quickly. “Just one bag.” 

“That should be enough,” Poe nodded. 

“You went through my shit?” Ben asked his assistant, who shrunk back. 

“Relax, I was the one who helped him,” Leia said. “Ben, you have to go if you want to beat her to Paris.”

“What?” 

“So confused, this guy, hm?” Poe asked, clapping his brother on the shoulder. “There’s a helicopter waiting for you on the roof. It’ll take you to JFK. We got you a ticket on the direct flight, because somebody here was a cheapo who bought Rey the ticket with a London stopover.”

“I really am sorry about that, sir,” Mitaka said. 

“Don’t be,” Poe grinned at Mitaka. “Now, to my new in-laws. Should we discuss the merger?” 

Han Solo turned to his eldest son, suddenly left outside of a board meeting for once in his life, and couldn’t help but feel just a little bit sorry for him. He looked a little lost, like for the first time in his life, he had no idea where he was supposed to go now. 

Han walked over to Mitaka and picked up the bag of Ben’s clothes. Then he walked over to Ben, who looked at him. 

“Dad?” He asked, his voice small. Han’s heart wrenched, but he was a big boy who had to fix his own shit. 

“Go after her, kid,” he said, holding up a bag. “She’s not going to wait forever.”

Han had never seen Ben run so fast. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One chapter to go! Will these two dummies actually get it together long enough for me to write a happy ending? Fingers crossed. 
> 
> Just kidding. We all know how this is going to end.


	12. Chapter 12

The thing with running after someone from New York to Paris was that there was very, very little running involved. Ben would have rather run half naked from Manhattan to Long Island with nothing but his phone to guide the way than to have to sit for seven hours on a plane with nothing to do but think about how he was supposed to do this.

Should he buy flowers? Chocolates? Hire a band? Should he be on his knees? Was it possible to make it rain so he could seem extra pathetic?

And even on top of all of that, would Rey even want to see him, much less forgive him?

It was a long shot, and he knew his odds were terrible.

But then again, his family never really liked listening to the odds.

He had to try. He had never had to apologize to anyone before, and certainly not for something as awfully done as this. He didn’t deserve to have Rey, didn’t deserve to get a happy ending with her. But he would have been an idiot not to try, because he genuinely truly…wanted her. Cared about her.

Seven hours later, the taxi pulled up at the address his mother had texted him when he was halfway from Charles de Gaulle to Paris, an address in Montmarte, just across the Sacre Coeur. It was already evening, and the streets were lit only by the glow of a cafe across the street, and apartments above him. Rey’s building was on a slight incline, as most buildings on Montmarte were. Ben rang the doorbell, hoping desperately that she was there.

No answer. Where the hell could she be?

His stomach growled as he felt his world sway sideways for a second. He was still exhausted from lack of sleep the night before, and he’d barely slept on the plane. He could barely tell which way was up at this point.

He dropped his bag beside him and sat on the curb, feeling his body crumple forward. Seven hours later, and he still didn’t know what to say to make her forgive him, what strategy to use. And for someone who always knew exactly what was going to happen in a room before he walked in, this absolutely sucked. He felt stripped and defeated, holding nothing that she could ever want.

What was he even doing here?

“Ben?” An all too familiar voice asked. “You’re sitting on the ground.”

He looked up at her, and he couldn’t quite read the look on her face. But there she was, beautiful and luminous as always, holding a paper bag laden with food under her hip. Because of course the first thing she would buy when she got to her new apartment in Paris was food. She smelled slightly sweet, like she’d eaten an orange at some point, her lips still slightly wet with the juices.

“What?” He asked, because he needed to be sure she was really there.

“Come upstairs,” she said, nudging her head in the direction of her apartment. The words sounded almost cold to him, and he supposed he deserved that. Obviously.

“You’re letting me in?”

“It’s cold out,” Rey shrugged, and that was when Ben realized the massive distance that had come between them. She was pushing him so far away that he couldn’t think how to close the gap. “Your parents will kill me if I let you die from a cold.”

He didn’t have a choice but to follow her. Five floors up. Match that with the jetlag, the exhaustion, Ben felt like he was in a completely different universe, one where Rey was in perfect control of the entire situation, where he was the one to be unsure of himself and make all the missteps.

Who was he kidding, wasn’t that exactly what was happening now?

Rey said nothing as they walked in to the tiny apartment, walking over to the kitchenette to put the food away. Ben stood in the middle of the living room, unsure what do do, if he should even drop his bags.

“Are you hungry? I think I have enough takeout for two,” She said, and Ben slowly turned, as if making sure that Rey was real, that he was here, that this wasn’t a dream. “French onion soup, which I thought was ironic, but I’ve always liked the way Maz makes it, and I remember the cafe nearby makes it the same way.”

“Rey,” He finally said her name, and the weight of his guilt crushed him. “I’m sorry.”

She paused, but only for a quick second, moving on quickly to bustle about her kitchen, slicing up some slices of bread, retrieving butter from her little grocery haul.

“I was an idiot.”

He could have sworn that he heard her snort, as if to say, ‘no shit.’

“I made you feel exactly the way you didn’t want,” he said, not daring to move too much, as if sudden movement would make the illusion break, and he would be alone again. And god, Ben had waited for five years. He didn’t want to be alone again. He didn’t want her to walk away, or push her away. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I lied, and I’m sorry I manipulated you.”

He sat on the floor, giving way to his exhaustion, burying his face in the palms of his hands. He could hear someone gasping for breath. Shit, it was him.

“I shouldn’t have come here,” he said, getting a grip on himself, slowly trying to get up from the floor. “I’ll get a hotel and fly back.”

“Don’t,” Rey said suddenly, sharply, and the words cut through him like a knife. “If you go, then I will really never forgive you.”

Ben’s words lodged in his throat. She was holding up a breadknife, like she was getting ready to saw open his heart.

“Why can’t you just stay with me?” she continued. “That was all I wanted, Ben. For you to stay with me, the way you did when you were eighteen, that dark and stormy night at your house.”

She shook her head and continued to slice the bread. She looked much older than he did at that point, and he still couldn’t get up from the floor.

“Do you hate me?”

“No,” she said instantly. “I am still mad at you, though. I was really hurt, and I thought I would never get hurt again. I suppose it was stupid of me to think that way, but…”

“You’re not stupid.”

“I know,” she said gently, putting away the knife, moving around the kitchenette to sit in front of him. Close enough that their knees were touching. Close enough that he could smell her perfume on her skin, could feel her warm skin against his. He wished that he could look up and stare into her eyes. He didn’t know what color they were, but they made him feel safe. “You are, though. And I’m worried I might spend the rest of my life punishing you for what you did.”

“I would deserve it.”

“No you wouldn’t,” Rey shook her head. “And I don’t know if you’re going to hate me when I don’t live up to whatever image of me that you have in your head. It’s going to take a lot of work from both of us. I need to know that you’re willing.”

“That’s all I have,” he told her, and the confession was like tearing out a pice of his heart, no, his entire heart and putting out on display for her to take and chop if she so desired. Because that was the shitty part of all of this, wasn’t it? Take away the suit, the money, the corporation, what did Ben have left? “I don’t have anything to offer you, Rey. But I need you. And I don’t need anything.”

She took his hands in hers, and squeezed them. He looked up and saw her eyes, gorgeous and hazel, piercing into his soul, where she belonged.

“You have to learn to pull yourself out of your own head sometimes, Ben. You really hurt the people who love you. And I never asked for anything but your love. And I hope you’re sorry,” she said. “I really hope you are. Because if you’re not sorry, then you’re not going to try to do better. If you’re not sorry, I’m really going to regret this.”

Then she kissed him, and her lips tasted slightly sweet still. Ben was nearly knocked back by the force of the kiss, and he let Rey lead them, let Rey take what she wanted from him. _Take it all._

“I love you,” Ben said, softly, gently, brushing his hand on her cheek because he couldn’t believe she was here. “Can I stay in Paris?”

Rey pulled him close for a hug, and that was warmer, and more affirming than any kiss she could have given him. He heard her laugh.

“Paris is always a good idea,” she told him before she kissed him again, and pushed him back on the floor. And Ben had several sexual encounters in his life, but none as reverent and slow as this. He showered Rey’s body with adoration and apologies, savoring every slow touch and keeping himself together long enough so her pleasure came first.

 _This was what life with her would be like_ , he thought. Here they had all the time in the world, and while they still had a lot of things to work out together, as long as they were together. _She makes me see stars._

Their clothes were strewn on the floor, and Rey had just come down from the highs of her own orgasm when Ben kept his head together long enough to pull out from between Rey’s legs. And while she was in the throes of her own orgasm, she still managed to wrap her hand around his cock and pump him until his own orgasm crested and broke, spilling himself into his discarded work shirt.

Thank god he had a bag of clothes with him.

Rey laughed as Ben collapsed next to her, her face lit up by the glow of the moon. In the distance, someone was playing La Vie en Rose, and it just felt like the perfect welcome.

Rey curled up against him, their bodies still warm and slightly sweaty from sex. She kissed his shoulder.

“I love you too, Ben,” she told him, and at last, his heart settled, quieted, calmed. Peace settled over him in a wash of feeling, and he felt his entire body relax against the floor. “There’s still a lot we have to talk about.”

“I know,” he said, closing his eyes.

“You keep trying to push people away,” she told him. “Why?”

Why indeed. A question for the ages.

“I feel like I don’t deserve their love,” he whispered into the Paris night, and pulled Rey a little closer, because he was legitimately worried she would let him go. “I don’t deserve yours especially.”

“People give love freely regardless of if you deserve it or not,” she reminded him. “I think that’s one of the things your family taught me. Love can be unconditional, and it always makes room for more things. New things. And I think the fact that you worry about deserving your family’s love means that you love them too.”

“Do I?”

“More than you give yourself credit for,” He could feel her head shake against his chest. “You take care of people, and you have a good heart, Ben Solo. You have to remember to show it. I refuse to be the only one who knows.”

She sat up and placed her hand over his chest, so beautiful and luminous he could hardly believe she was real. He covered his hand over hers, the two of them counting heartbeats. Ben closed his eyes.

“What do you want from Paris?” She asked him.

“You,” he said.

“It can’t just be me,” she shook her head. “You can’t put that pressure on me.”

He knew that. One of the things that had terrified him about relationships was that pressure of being the center of someone else’s universe. That eventually he would fail expectations with his inability to say the right thing, or do the right thing. He wouldn’t put that on Rey.

Ben opened his eyes and looked up at her again. “All that time I set aside, I want to use it all. With you, if you would have me. You make me want things, Rey. Things I never thought I could ever have.”

He took her hand from where it rested on his chest and kissed her palm.

“I want for the both of us to never be alone again.”

* * *

_One year later._

Rey saw him from a distance. It would have been hard not to spot him, her having known his form, his shape since she was a child. He was pacing, looking a little worried as he stuffed his hands in his pockets, brushing his thick locks of hair away from his face. Had someone been painting the scene, the man pacing in front of the flowers and other fantastic sights of the Tuileries would have made amazing contrast.

Then he saw her, and his face absolutely lit up. Rey held up her camera and snapped a photo. He still didn’t love it when it came to having his picture taken, but he was used to it. Rey really couldn’t help herself around him.

“Hey,” he said gently, kissing her lips just as she lowered the camera. Rey caught him before he stood up back to his full height, wrapping her arms around his neck to hug him tightly. Not for any reason beyond the fact that she could. And she really enjoyed it. “Long day?”

“A bit,” Rey sighed. “Bad lighting at an otherwise lovely location, but nothing I can’t handle. I love you in a suit.”

“Thank you,” he said with the smallest of smiles, loosening his tie. It was summer in Paris, and it was sweltering hot. Ben didn’t like waiting for Rey in parks and gardens, complaining that the dusty ground only hurt his eyes and got him dirty. But Rey had never met a garden she didn’t love, and would usually find him sulking under a tree.

“I had to meet with a potential partner here in Paris for the Sevin Solo Initiative. We’re looking to upload all the grade school courses we worked on for kids in low income houses in the Philippines.”

“And the company?”

“Wanted to provide an Internet connection so they can have access,” Ben smiled. He never really could shed the businessman in him, thankfully Ben and Poe had been working closely together for the last month, trying to find a balance in between the two brothers that could handle running a huge conglomerate from two different cities. It turned out that Poe was pretty good with big picture goals, making sure the Solo Corp. did everything in its power to do good things. Ben was better at smaller, more minute details, keeping track of teams. It was an adjustment, but the brothers did well enough.

“Are you hungry?” He asked Rey, as she slipped her arm around his and they both walked in the direction of Angelina on Rue de Rivoli. They were a bit late, but not too much.

“Always, but I can wait,” Rey smiled as they walked together. “Where did you say Luke moved again?”

“To the Lake House,” Ben snorted.

“What! Did you tell him that we…”

“Oh no,” Ben shook his head. “I’ll keep that with me forever. I did have someone buy a new mattress, don’t worry.”

The other thing that changed in the last month was that Solo Mansion was turned into an orphanage, funded by Solo Corp. Leia and Han saw how big the house suddenly was without their two sons and Rey, and decided to move to a much smaller place in upstate New York, and bought houses for the rest of their staff in the same neighborhood.

They approached the restaurant and Rey gave the name Leia put in the reservation. A waitress immediately approached them and gruffly led them in the direction of a private room in the back.

“This is going to be loud,” Ben muttered, his hand on the small of Rey’s back now.

“Oh you love it,” Rey grinned. “Plus, we get to meet Poe and Finn’s baby!”

“So he can cry when you try to smell him so hard?” Ben joked, and Rey gasped in protest. They visited Hux and Rose with baby Hattie last year, and Ben never let Rey forget how hard little Hattie cried when all Rey tried to do was smell her.

They’ll have a kid of their own to make cry, eventually. But for now…

“Ben!” Leia practically leapt up off of her chair as she moved across the room to hug her eldest. “Come meet my grandson!”

“She says that to everyone,” Han chuckled, returning the hug Rey gave him.

“Mom, be careful with Inigo!” Poe groaned, but too late, because Leia was already offering the boy to Rey and Ben, whose hearts appropriately melted at the sight.

“He looks like Finn,” Rey smiled, letting the baby wrap his tiny fingers around hers.

“Thank god,” Ben joked, and it showed how much he’d changed in the last year when nobody in the family reacted to the fact that Ben Solo was actually making a joke. And while the big things about Ben didn’t really change (he was still pretty stubborn, and had a tendency to bury himself in his problems before he remembered he could talk to Rey about them), he seemed happier now. More settled.

Rey walked over to where Chewie was and gave him a huge hug. The man was not a fan of Paris, but for his family, he would do anything. He pat her on the head, and they discussed his and Maz’ wedding in Morocco in the summer.

“You’re looking good,” Finn nudged her with his elbow while the Solos were preoccupied with Inigo. “Love looks good on you.”

“It looks good on you too,” Rey chuckled. “And hey, the babysitting offer is still on the table. Anytime, anywhere. I would walk to New York for a hit of that new baby smell.”

“You’re starting to sound a little creepy, Rey,” Finn laughed, and it felt good to laugh with her friend. “And I’m so tried I’m going to take you up on that offer. Poe and I will be in Paris for another week. I know he and Ben are busy with Solo corp stuff, and I’m here for a medical conference…”

“Deal. Anytime, any day.”

* * *

Ben and Rey walked back through the Tuileries after that satisfying lunch, promising to meet up again with the family for dinner, because who knew the Solos could be clingy?

“It’s all your fault, you know,” Ben said as Rey walked a little ahead of him, and she stopped in front of a particularly large tree. “You changed us all. All from on top of a tree.”

“I think my tree climbing days are over,” Rey leaned against the trunk and smiled as Ben came close, leaning close with his hand on the trunk near her head. She smiled, enjoying having him so close. He always smelled so incredible. “Are you happy, Ben?”

He smiled, and the man so rarely smiled that she didn’t need to say anything else. She’d worried about this, that he would hate the city, would refuse to slow down, would leave her. It still scared her sometimes. But not today. Today, Ben Solo was here, and he was happy. Maybe one day they would move back to New York. Maybe one day they would be in completely different worlds again.

But there was today, there was this.

“Marry me, Rey,” he said to her, his eyes shining and as serious as ever. “Marry me for my money.”

Rey laughed out loud and pressed her hand to his cheek, her thumb brushing the skin there. In the last year, she’d seen Ben struggle with his new life, trying to say what he was feeling more, tell people how much they meant to him more. She’d seen him accept her love, and accept that he was worthy of it. Sometimes she forgot those lessons too.

But they had Paris. They had each other, and somehow Rey knew things were going to be okay.

“Sweetheart,” she told him. “You forget I’m a rich girl too. Ten million dollars.”

“Give or take a couple of million,” Ben chuckled and smiled, because he knew just as well as her that she was making her own money from her photography, which was nothing short of a miracle. “If you won’t marry for my money, then marry me for love,” he said, brushing his nose against hers, his lashes fluttering against her skin. “I hope I’ve made you happy. And if you give me the chance, I’ll make you happy for the rest of our lives. Together.”

She slipped her hand into the pocket of his pants, where she had seen him put the box Leia had surreptitiously passed him at lunch. Unfortunately for Ben, the surprise was ruined by Han coughing until Rey got the hint.

Ben didn’t look at all surprised when she opened the box in front of him. The ring was elegant and simple, a rose gold band with a blue diamond in a unique pattern.

“I promised Mom I would wait a little,” he admitted. “But I thought, everyone was already here, and you’re so happy…”

“Yes,” Rey said, grinning up at him. “Ben. Yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's all she wrote! I love, love, loved semi-pantsing my way through this fanfic, and I want to thank you all for sticking with me on this, and for all your lovely kudos and comments. 
> 
> You made me feel a little less lonely, even if for a little bit. <3


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